The archetyp official link is either reachable or it is not; everything between those two states is diagnosis. This post is a status check in the strict sense: what "working" means for an onion service, how the current endpoints are behaving, and how to verify the answer yourself rather than trusting a screenshot from a forum thread.
What "Working" Means for an Onion Service
A .onion address does not expire the way a clearnet domain does. It is derived from the service's long-term key, so it resolves only while the server behind it is publishing descriptors to the Tor network. That makes "still working" a question with three parts: is the endpoint reachable, is it the genuine service, and is it functioning normally once you are inside.
Reachability is binary. Authenticity is not — a phishing clone can be perfectly reachable. Functionality is the softest signal of the three: a login page that loads but rejects every credential is reachable, genuine-looking, and still broken. Any status report that collapses these three properties into a single "online" flag is not reporting anything useful.
Current Endpoint Status
At the time of this check, the archetyp official link resolves through Tor Browser and serves the expected landing page. The mirror set is unchanged:
- Primary: Primary Endpoint
- Mirror 1:
- Mirror 2:
All three are v3 onion services, which means the address itself is a public key. There is no DNS layer to spoof and no certificate authority to query — the string above either matches the service or it does not.
Primary Endpoint
The primary address is the canonical reference. When mirrors disagree with each other, the primary is the tiebreaker. Treat any URL that differs from it by even one character as a different service, because cryptographically it is one.
Mirrors
Mirrors exist for redundancy, not for identity. They should serve the same signed content as the primary. A mirror that loads faster but shows different content, different PGP material, or a modified login form has failed the only test that matters. Reachability of a mirror is a convenience; consistency with the primary is the requirement.
How to Verify the Link Yourself
Verification is a procedure, not an impression. Run it the same way every time:
- Open Tor Browser. Never attempt a .onion address from a clearnet browser or through a proxy service; both break the security model the address scheme depends on.
- Paste the address rather than clicking it. This rules out link-shortener and referrer tricks on aggregator sites.
- Compare the resolved URL character by character against the signed canonical list. One substituted character is the entire attack.
- Check the PGP fingerprint shown at login against the market's published key. If the fingerprint on the page does not match the key you have on file, stop.
- Authenticate with 2FA where enabled. A landing page can be cloned; a working second factor cannot be faked by a static mirror.
- Cross-check one mirror. If the primary and a mirror both fail while your Tor connection is otherwise healthy, the problem is on the service side, not yours.
Steps 3 and 4 are the ones people skip, and they are the only two that detect a compromise rather than an outage.
Common Failure Modes
When the archetyp official link appears "down," the cause is usually one of the following:
- Scheduled maintenance. Short, announced where possible, and resolved without any change to the URL set.
- DDoS mitigation. Heavy load often surfaces as captcha walls or slow circuit builds. The service is up; throughput is degraded.
- Mirror rotation. Dead mirrors get replaced. A rotated mirror list is normal operations; a silently changed primary address is not.
- Local faults. Clock skew, stale Tor circuits, or a blocked guard relay can make every onion service look offline at once. Test a second unrelated .onion before concluding anything.
- Phishing clones. Always reachable, never genuine. This is the failure mode that verification procedures exist for.
A link that resolves is not a link that is correct. Reachability is a network property; authenticity is a cryptographic one. Confusing the two is how credential phishing works.
Downtime Is Not an Exit
The question behind "is the link still working" is usually "is the market gone." These are separate questions with separate tests. An outage is characterized by unreachable endpoints and silence. An orderly wind-down is characterized by signed notices — messages authenticated with the market's established PGP key, delivered through channels that were already trusted before the announcement.
The operational test is continuity of signed communication. If the endpoints are down and no signed update has appeared through the established channels, the correct posture is uncertainty, not assumption in either direction. Historically, abrupt endings in this ecosystem announce nothing; that is precisely why the absence of a signed notice cannot be read as reassurance, and why a signed notice is the only signal worth acting on.
Conversely, do not treat a working login page as proof of solvency. Availability and balance integrity are independent systems. The former is what a status check covers; the latter is a function of your own operational discipline — release hygiene, 2FA, and key custody.
Status Summary
Current state, as of this check: primary endpoint responsive, both mirrors consistent, no changes to the address set, no anomalous PGP material
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