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    What Is the Dark Web and Has Your Info Been Exposed?

    Learn what the dark web is, how your personal information can end up there, and how to check if your data has been exposed in a breach.

    5 min read 5 stepsApril 20, 2026Verified April 2026
    1

    Check your email on Have I Been Pwned

    ~41s
    On your computer or phone, open a web browser and go to haveibeenpwned.com. In the search box, type your email address and click the pwned? button (or tap the search icon). Within seconds, the site shows you whether your email address appears in any known data breaches, and which breaches specifically. A green result means no breaches found for that email. A red result with details means your email appeared in one or more breaches.

    Quick Tip

    Check all email addresses you use or have used in the past — an old address from years ago may have been exposed. The site does not store your email in a way that exposes you; it uses a security technique called k-anonymity that protects your privacy while checking your data.

    2

    Understand what your results mean

    ~37s
    If your email was found in a breach, the site lists each breach and what type of data was exposed. "Email and password" is the most common combination and the most important to address. "Social Security numbers" or "financial information" is more serious. "Email only" is lower risk but still worth knowing about. The breach may have happened years ago — this is normal, as breaches are sometimes not discovered until long after they occur.

    Quick Tip

    Being in a breach does not mean your identity has been stolen — it means your information is out there and you should take protective steps. Most people whose data was breached never experience direct financial harm because they take precautions promptly.

    3

    Change passwords for any affected accounts

    ~38s
    If the breach involved a password, go to the website or service named in the breach and change your password immediately. Use a new password you have not used anywhere else — at least 12 characters with a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols. If you used the same password on other websites, change it on those as well. A password manager can help you generate and store new unique passwords.

    Warning

    If the breached service was your email provider, changing your email password is urgent. Your email account is the key to resetting passwords on all your other accounts — if a criminal has access to your email, they can reset your bank password, social media accounts, and more.

    4

    Set up ongoing dark web monitoring

    ~25s
    To be notified of future breaches automatically, register your email address on Have I Been Pwned for free alerts. Click Notify Me at the top of the site and enter your email. You will receive an email notification if your address appears in any future breach added to the database. You can also check whether your iPhone's iCloud account offers Passwords and Keychain Monitoring — go to Settings, then your Apple ID name, then iCloud.
    5

    Take protective action based on what was exposed

    ~23s
    If financial information or Social Security numbers were exposed in a breach, consider freezing your credit reports (detailed in our separate guide) and placing a fraud alert with the credit bureaus. If health information was exposed, monitor your medical accounts for unfamiliar claims. If passwords were exposed, prioritize changing passwords on any account where you reused that password. Contact your bank if any banking information appeared.

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    The "dark web" is a term you may have heard in news coverage of hacking incidents or identity theft. Despite how it sounds, the dark web is not a mysterious or exotic place — it is a part of the internet that is not accessible through regular web browsers like Chrome or Safari, and where activity is intentionally anonymous. While it has some legitimate uses, it is also where criminals buy and sell stolen personal information after data breaches.

    When a company suffers a data breach — a hacker breaks into their computer systems — the stolen information often ends up being sold or traded on dark web markets. This information can include email addresses, passwords, Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, home addresses, and phone numbers. Criminals purchase this data to commit identity theft, break into accounts, or send targeted scam messages.

    You may have already been affected by a breach without knowing it. Major breaches at companies like Equifax, LinkedIn, Yahoo, Adobe, Marriott, and many others exposed billions of records over the past decade. It is very common for ordinary people's information to appear in these databases without ever having noticed anything wrong.

    The good news is there are free ways to check whether your email address appears in known data breaches. Have I Been Pwned (haveibeenpwned.com) is a trusted free service created by security researcher Troy Hunt that maintains a database of billions of compromised email addresses from known breaches. You can enter your email address and within seconds see a list of any breaches where your information appeared.

    Many services now also offer dark web monitoring as part of their security packages. Apple includes Dark Web Monitoring in certain iCloud+ plans. Google offers it through Google One. Credit monitoring services often include it as well. These services continuously scan dark web databases and alert you if your information appears in a new breach.

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    Official Resources

    FTC Consumer ProtectionCISA — Cybersecurity TipsAARP Fraud Watch Network

    Sources used to create and verify this guide. View all sources →

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    What Is the Dark Web and Has Your Info Been Exposed? — Step-by-Step Guide | TekSure