From your question to evidence you can inspect
See what happens between your question and a cited answer: the quote, the sources, the evidence checks, the receipt, and where the transcript is stored.
How do you search the dark web?
You type a specific question and choose Web, Onion or Web + Onion. The service then searches the sources it has been permitted to search, extracts text from the pages it retrieves, and answers with citations you can open. Retrieval happens on the service rather than in your browser, so nothing has to be installed to read the result.
Question → quote → search
Your question and source choice create a short-lived quote. Review the maximum before starting. The server admits bounded work before reserving credits; a busy queue does not create a charge. A repeated submission with the same idempotency key returns the original job.
Sources → evidence → answer
Enabled search adapters discover permitted public pages. Bounded retrieval extracts text, records source versions and checks citations. A source-only answer means that references were found without a supported composed answer. No evidence means the service should abstain.
What happens when no evidence is found?
The service abstains instead of composing an answer it cannot support. A no-evidence outcome releases the credit hold, as do failed and cancelled requests, so an unanswered question is not a charged one. No evidence means the enabled sources did not supply support for your question; it is not proof that no such information exists anywhere.
Receipt → your chosen history
The terminal receipt records the final charge. Failed, cancelled and no-evidence outcomes release the hold. The browser receives the answer independently of Cloud saving. Session and browser choices affect transcript storage, while processing and financial records have separate lifetimes.
Related help
- Dark web search, with evidence you can inspect
- Which sources can contribute?
- Evidence before confidence
- What is protected, and what is not
- Searching an index differs from opening an onion site
- Useful answers require more than fluent text
- Ask a question and inspect the answer
- Choose what is saved and where
Content revision 2026-09-07.