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I have been reading a bit about the deep web and the dark web, and that you need to connect to the onion network through a VPN to navigate anonymously.

I'm currently using Tails and its default system: onion circuits. I have read that onion circuits is just a free VPN, is this correct?

I have read as well that, to check if you are navigating anonymously, you need to go to some what-is-my-ip web and verify that it can't determine your IP or that it matches with the VPN's one. Is this correct? I don't understand very well what is the VPN's IP, could you give more details about it?

EDIT

Of course I'm using the Tor browser, it comes with Tails by default.

Martel
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    Never heard of "onion circuits", don't think we should be responsible for evaluating unlinked resources. "I have read" almost always means that you should post a link to the resource you've read, otherwise people would have to spend time just researching the context instead of writing an answer. – Marcus Müller Sep 17 '20 at 21:58
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    Tor is not a VPN, and neither Tor nor a VPN can guarantee anonymity if they are not used correctly. Anonymity is a complex subject, and you might want to look up the term "OPSEC" if you want to learn more. I'm also pretty sure on Tor's website there's a page that warns you about Tor's limitations and gives you some OPSEC tips. – reed Sep 18 '20 at 07:48
  • Perhaps we can try and be more welcoming of new users of this forum, with politeness. – Kind Contributor Sep 18 '20 at 10:15
  • @reed I'm asking if `onion circuits` is a VPN, haven't mentioned Tor being a VPN – Martel Sep 18 '20 at 11:21

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You should look into TOR browser if you're looking to browse the web for the most part anonymously. It's a little more beginner friendly than tails.

To answer your question directly, yes, the easiest way to verify you are accessing the web via a TOR exit node is to go to google or DuckDuckGo and type 'whats is my IP' before then after you connect through TOR or Tails and confirm the IP has changed.

g0stSec
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    You are right that TOR is a good answer to the question the Question Poster asked. However, the person did not state why they want to browse anonymously. Some services are not usable with a TOR browser. For example, e-mail websites can't be accessed with a TOR browser, if you want to create an e-mail address anonymously and access it anonymously. – Amol Soneji Sep 18 '20 at 05:13
  • @Amol Soneji - ProtonMail accepts Tor connections and even has a hidden service onion. – user10216038 Sep 19 '20 at 04:00
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Correct, you just internet search for "what is my ip". You are looking to see if that number is different than your expected home IP address. To get your home IP address, you might check on another computer (or smartphone on wifi) that isn't running Tor, to see what your own IP address is and compare.

You might also choose to use a geoip database to see the country of the exit node IP address. Usually, it will be a different country to the one you are in, but not always. see https://www.maxmind.com/en/geoip-demo

Tor uses multiple exit nodes that have different IP addresses. Your anonymized exit IP connection will change to different ones at times.

You are correct in describing the experience as a "Free VPN". That's basically the experience for end-users. Of course, more technical people thinking as engineers would understand that it works differently to something like OpenVpn. However, even such a view is subjective, the term "VPN" is an ambiguous and broad term.

Kind Contributor
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You should read this blog - https://blog.bolehvpn.net/tor-over-vpn-vpn-over-tor-which-is-better/

it suggests connecting to Tor through a VPN to generally offer higher security, while connecting to a VPN through Tor generally provides better anonymity. While both have their own advantages and disadvantages, you would still need to trust your VPN provider as they still have activity records on their servers.

forest
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El Toro
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    **No!** Connecting to a VPN through Tor defeats Tor anonymity. You are identifying yourself via your VPN account and losing the protection of Tor. – user10216038 Sep 19 '20 at 04:07
  • @user10216038 Not only that, but you are vulnerable to fingerprinting through tools like p0f (if your VPN comes after Tor). – forest Apr 25 '22 at 21:53