From zero to logged in
Opening Osiris Market in Tor Browser
Everything below assumes a normal computer or an Android phone and no prior Tor experience. The whole first run takes about ten minutes, most of it waiting.
- osiriseultmx3so5ef6ayasy4kdyekbywr7pyggpmjazeogxoyaodsyd.onion
- osirislivpetlbabbl3zzqhupurfkxxbzbheu3bkrshkaiwg2hcxbyqd.onion
- osirisydmlx47esm6ylhzhtnjrucgnymi7beqoyzze5jn3opbr3zy4id.onion
The steps
- Get the real Tor Browser.
From torproject.org for desktop, or the Play Store or F-Droid for Android. Not an extension inside another browser, and not a "Tor browser" downloaded from a third-party site. An extension routes one tab through Tor while the rest of the page loads over your normal connection, which undoes the point.
- Update it.
Old builds get noticed. Tor Browser updates itself; if it has not in a while, do it by hand before the first attempt.
- Copy, do not type.
Copy one of the three addresses from the panel on this page. Typing 64 characters by hand is how the first wrong letter happens, and a wrong letter is a different website.
- Paste into the address bar.
New tab, paste, Enter. The first load is slow, because a hidden service builds a circuit before the page exists. Patience is part of the protocol.
- Wait out the queue.
You may land on a dark page that says you are in a queue and that you must not refresh. That is the market's front door, a gate that lets visitors in slowly instead of all at once. Refreshing puts you back at the end of the line. A minute or two is normal in a busy hour.
- Check the address before you log in.
The full .onion in the address bar must match what you copied. Look at the last six characters, where typos and vanity clones hide. The market also prints its own onion on the page, and the two must agree exactly.
- Log in, or register.
First time? Register, set a long unique password, and add your PGP key. The Osiris Market login itself is a username, a password, and a captcha; accounts can additionally require a PGP-signed login. Browsing the catalog does not require an account.
When a load goes wrong
| Stuck on "Connecting" or "New identity" | The circuit is slow. Click the onion icon in the toolbar, choose a new circuit, and reload. After two or three failed circuits, try the second address from the panel. |
| The page loads but it is not the market | You are on a clone or on a retired onion. Leave the tab, take a new circuit, and re-copy from the panel above. Then check the address the way the verify page describes. |
| Everything is slow | That is the network, not a fault. Markets over Tor are slower than clearnet sites. Images and search take longer. Nothing is broken. |
| You are on a normal browser with a VPN | That is not Tor. Close it and open Tor Browser. A VPN and Tor are different tools doing different jobs. |