Silk Road forums

Discussion => Newbie discussion => Topic started by: BritishSovereign on February 02, 2013, 02:24 pm

Title: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: BritishSovereign on February 02, 2013, 02:24 pm
Is there any way I'd be able to download SilkRoad marketplace so I have an offline store of all vendors, their details, products, reviews etc? I know it'd put strain on the server, but I'm thinking I'm happy to make this download then host it elsewhere on the deepweb as a pre-made package and update it regularly so you only have to do the download of the 1 package and not every page, reducing server impact.

I also know of security concerns that I could change PGP details or e-mails etc, but I guess that's a risk we're not going to get around, but if it can happen then I'm sure vendors can always just post to confirm their details are correct on the package to gain some trust in it at least to serve as an emergency backup.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: maple on February 02, 2013, 04:03 pm
I am not sure that would work very well. That seems like it could take up quite a bit of storage, and it would not be constantly up to date.

If you are not extremely paranoid and have an Android phone, Orbot and Orweb allow you to access the deep web from your phone.

What exactly is your goal with this idea? Providing a backup or providing a way for people to look at stuff without needing to be online?
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: medicalcannibas420 on February 02, 2013, 04:06 pm
I am pretty new here....but I would say not a good idea
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: BritishSovereign on February 02, 2013, 04:21 pm
I am not sure that would work very well. That seems like it could take up quite a bit of storage, and it would not be constantly up to date.

If you are not extremely paranoid and have an Android phone, Orbot and Orweb allow you to access the deep web from your phone.

What exactly is your goal with this idea? Providing a backup or providing a way for people to look at stuff without needing to be online?

Phones aren't the way to go on security so I'll have to give that a miss.

The aim is simply to have a backup incase SilkRoad goes down for example, or I just want to browse around and save page loading times. Keeping it completely up to date isn't an issue, neither is storage as of course I'd have to check the actual page before I could place an order to begin with or at least contact the vendor. Once a week is a decent time to reupdate it if it's only for those purposes.

If of course people want a copy of it I am more than happy to provide that and anyone unsure of it's security just doesn't need to download it because although I'm willing to help out anyone I can, I just would like it for my own purposes at the end of the day.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: maple on February 02, 2013, 06:33 pm
Well, a backup in case SR goes down could be nice. That is something you would want to discuss with the staff I think though.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: DankSources on February 02, 2013, 07:21 pm
Basically, you want to run a site-indexing software, that builds the entire site up from the ground based on public listings.

There are several softwares that can do this, all you have to do is keep the connection going by providing your username and password once in a while after a time-out.

I don't see why you can't do this yourself, and then use it yourself.
No coding involved, just using a program.  Hosting it for other people is a simple answer. Don't do it. Security risks all over the place. For you and for all of the downloaders.

Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: roger ramjet on February 03, 2013, 08:04 am
too easy .................
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: kittenfluff on February 03, 2013, 08:44 am
Is there any way I'd be able to download SilkRoad marketplace so I have an offline store of all vendors, their details, products, reviews etc? I know it'd put strain on the server, but I'm thinking I'm happy to make this download then host it elsewhere on the deepweb as a pre-made package and update it regularly so you only have to do the download of the 1 package and not every page, reducing server impact.

I also know of security concerns that I could change PGP details or e-mails etc, but I guess that's a risk we're not going to get around, but if it can happen then I'm sure vendors can always just post to confirm their details are correct on the package to gain some trust in it at least to serve as an emergency backup.

A couple of issues with this. First, you would only ever be able to view the site as-was when you cached it, no knew listings would be shown. Second, you would never be able to buy anything as transactions have to go through the SR servers, and that's where your SR wallet is. Third, it would be less secure as there would be now login/captcha allowing much easier bot access, unless you're planning on adding the login screen, in which case....

..... my biggest issue - this is exactly the kind of thing a phishing scam or other scammer would do! Duplicate the site, harvest login details, set up fake transactions and scam BTC out of innocent buyers. IMO if you want to help SR then set up a TOR relay and get more bandwidth, and buy lots of stuff so they make money and can maintain their own servers at a level that's appropriate. I have no idea of their system for avoiding the authorities, but I do notice brief periods that I cannot connect - I think that this is an inevitable consequence of the nature of the market and the security it needs to maintain. I suggest simply getting over it and enjoying the fact that it exists at all.

BTW, I'm not saying you're a scammer, just that my very first thought when I read your post was "that's exactly what a scammer would do, only they probably wouldn't ask how to do it on the SR forum first..." and I certainly would never access aby such site, even if it existed. SR is risky enough on it's own...
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: BritishSovereign on February 03, 2013, 01:53 pm
In response to all of the above, there may have been a bit of misunderstanding. I'm not attempting to create any kind of offline login or up to date by the second listing, it's simply an offline version you can browse but of course you can't purchase from, it's simply for convenience of being able to browse without page load times if I'm just searching around and of course a backup if SR went down as all the vendor PGP keys, e-mails etc are on their profile so I could continue business after SR went down.

I'm not trying to create logins or any kind of phishing scam, it's simply HTML viewing pages/images.

I have tried looking for site-indexing software but I'm not very computer literate so hooking it up to Tor is proving difficult :(.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: AmnesiaBlackout on February 03, 2013, 03:56 pm
I have tried looking for site-indexing software but I'm not very computer literate so hooking it up to Tor is proving difficult :(.

If the program allows it, set the proxy (SOCKS) to 127.0.0.1:9050. It'll be extremely slow indexing the website though.

I'm not sure it'll be a good idea having all of these pages stored on your computer though, if your computer ever got seized you'd probably get a lot of questions.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: BritishSovereign on February 03, 2013, 04:09 pm
I have tried looking for site-indexing software but I'm not very computer literate so hooking it up to Tor is proving difficult :(.

If the program allows it, set the proxy (SOCKS) to 127.0.0.1:9050. It'll be extremely slow indexing the website though.

I'm not sure it'll be a good idea having all of these pages stored on your computer though, if your computer ever got seized you'd probably get a lot of questions.

It won't be on my computer, not to worry. I'm currently at paranoid level as I will begin vending in the coming weeks/months and have been around on SR much longer than this account has.

Thanks for the info though!
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: donatto on February 03, 2013, 04:24 pm
i dont think it as a good idea
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: AussieMitch on February 03, 2013, 04:28 pm
Having a product list would be good, but not that useful considering how quickly listings are updated.
Title: Re: Downloading SilkRoad
Post by: BritishSovereign on February 03, 2013, 05:16 pm
Why is it not a good idea? If you want to criticise, make it productive otherwise I'm going to disregard the comment. I'm clued up on PGP, TrueCrypt and the rest of it, so storing it isn't a problem unless you can point something out that I've missed.