Eerie websites

Not every unnerving thing on the internet needs gore or jump scares. These eerie websites work by quiet suggestion: a voice reading numbers on shortwave radio, a face that was never born, a library that contains every possible page. Think of them as creepy safe websites, the kind you can open at work or at midnight.

Priyom.org documents number stations, the shortwave broadcasts that read out strings of digits. WebSDR lets you tune real radio receivers around the world from your browser, so you can listen to static, Morse code and chatter. The Library of Babel implements Borges's idea of a library with every combination of characters; search for any text and you will find it on a page, usually surrounded by gibberish. This Person Does Not Exist shows a new AI face on every reload, and each one is a little too convincing.

A few entries come with real warnings. SCP Foundation is a huge collaborative horror-fiction wiki, and some entries are disturbing. NUKEMAP is a serious educational tool about weapon effects, sobering rather than spooky.

This is our thinnest category, with nine entries at launch, and it grows by submission, so if you know a good one, send it our way. For the full Halloween-friendly set, see the Creepy Websites list, and for the machine-made kind, AI & Bots. Or let the button decide how brave you are.