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Can DuckDuckGo Become the Anti-Google? (marketplace.org)
"Recently, a privacy-oriented search engine called DuckDuckGo raised $10 million from a Canadian pension fund," reports Marketplace.org, saying the privacy-focused search engine is "trying to establish itself as the anti-Google."
An anonymous reader quotes their report:
"So it's like Google, except when you search on it, you're completely anonymous," said Gabriel Weinberg, CEO of the company. The searches are encrypted. The site knows where you are, but only while you're searching, and it doesn't store your personal information. "We serve you the search results and we throw away your personal information...so your IP address and things like that. And we don't actually store any cookies by default. And so when you search on DuckDuckGo, it's like every time you're a new user and we know nothing about you..." Weinberg said about a quarter of Americans have taken some action to protect their privacy, and DuckDuckGo searches have been growing about 50 percent a year.
"We are proud to have a profitable business model that doesn't rely on collecting personal data," the company tweeted in June, and this week they also shared a quote from a Harvard Business Review article that asked "How far can the surveillance economy go?"
"Most consumers are either unaware of the personal info they share online or, quite understandably, unable to determine the cost of sharing it -- if not both."
"We are proud to have a profitable business model that doesn't rely on collecting personal data," the company tweeted in June, and this week they also shared a quote from a Harvard Business Review article that asked "How far can the surveillance economy go?"
"Most consumers are either unaware of the personal info they share online or, quite understandably, unable to determine the cost of sharing it -- if not both."
Link? Never mind, I'll Google it.
and everything seems to be working out well. The one thing that is annoying is the add DuckDuckGo dialog and the Cookie Dialog close each time you start your browser (DuckDuckGo is my home). Wish I could just go in to the options and turn them off for good. Maybe I can but I did not see that during my quickie setup.
;)
Other than that I like it so far!
Just my 2 cents
I've been using DuckDuckGo for about a year as the search on my main computer. I've found it always gives me good results...i.e. what I'm looking for... It's fast. I've never felt the need to switch to a different search engine.
It does have ads but these are clearly labeled. The ads seem to be targeted to my search terms which is appropriate.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
DuckDuckGo's results are a compilation of "over 400" sources,[45] including Yahoo! Search BOSS; Wikipedia; Wolfram Alpha; Bing; its own Web crawler (the DuckDuckBot); and others.[3][45][46] It also uses data from crowdsourced sites, including Wikipedia, to populate "Zero-click Info" boxes – grey boxes above the results that display topic summaries and related topics.[10]
It's an American business, based in the U.S. That means they're susceptible to government subpoenas and gag-orders, just like any other American business.
When intelligence agencies deliver a court- and gag-order that says they want all searches originating from a particular IP, and youre not allowed to say a word about it, then DuckDuckGo obeys and begins recording the data and hands it over. They are not above American law, and whoever gets the court order either obeys or goes to federal prison, it's just that simple.
You may want to consider switching to startpage.com and select their EU servers in the settings. It's also another anonymous Google-backed search engine, but the EU part makes it a better choice.
... that you're not being fully monetized?
I use DuckDuckGo for quite some time now, and in most cases it works well. Just like Google, though, in harder cases it tends to lists loads of results which have no relation whatsoever to the search terms, even if the terms were typed in double quotes – only that DuckDuckGo's result are even worse than Google's. Sometimes they just can't admit not having found anything useful, it seems.
DuckDuckGo is a decent enough search engine and I generally support it, but it has a few small frustrating problems with it that I'd like to see changed. First off, it's 'safe mode' content filter is on by default. This is annoying to those of us that are knowledgeable enough to realize how big of a problem cookies are and keep them disabled or filtered by default with a browser add-on. While that's not always an issue, as with any filter list you can get things filtered out erroneously. And my second companion is actually directly linked to my first one. If you do auto delete your cookies you get two pop ups for the site each time you load it. One asking if you want to add DuckDuckGo to your browser and the other suggesting you make them your star page. Neither are hardly deal breakers, but still annoying.
I've switched as many services I can to companies that, at a minimum, care about individual privacy.
I used to use Google's cloud products exclusively - no more. It's Protonmail and Duck Duck Go for me - for now. Apple, under Tim Cook, seems to be taking privacy seriously as well.
I am willing to pay for services that advertise privacy as a feature.
Love DDG. The only thing that keeps me having to switch back to Google is the lack of a "last year" option (or custom date range) when refining search results. According to the bottom of this page they are working on it, although this feature has been pending for a very long time.
The problem with not knowing anything about the user is that it often significantly reduces the quality and usefulness of search results. For example, consider a search for "string".
Neither result set would be appropriate for both audiences. (Every now and then, this goes hilariously wrong, and I have to add "-programming" or "-science" or whatever for some search, but most of the time, it's right.)
The thing is, a lot of people complain about tracking, but the fact of the matter is that all that tracking is done to produce better outcomes for the user. Whether that data is used to improve search results or to improve ad targeting, the user benefits by getting results that are more tailored to his or her interests and seeing less crap that he or she won't have the least bit of interest in. Far from surveillance, I would call that personalization. As long as Google aggressively protects the data that they collect and keeps it private, I find it to be a good thing.
But obviously, different people have different perspectives, and some folks are more distrustful of data collection than others. For the folks on the distrustful end of the spectrum, it is good that alternatives like DDG exist. And no matter where you fall on that spectrum, I think you'll agree that there is a strong need for tough privacy laws, to ensure that if Google's management decides to retire and move to Bermuda, the next batch of execs won't be allowed to use that data in different ways that violate our privacy, such as selling it to the highest bidder, or giving it away to companies that do research for political parties, or publishing our private information for all to see.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
In other words, they may as well be doing this:
if self.engine != Google:
return self.engine.search(query)
Quite frankly, if I can't find it on DDG, I probably don't need it anyway. Not to mention how google ranks crap based on politics.
Google and Bing get paid for it. Making it easy for other search engines to use them just means more money for them, like when Microsoft convinced Yahoo to become a Bing skin.
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I have been using https://startpage.com/ for many years. Its parent (lxquick) actually predates DuckDuckGo.
I lost count of how many people's machines I have switched to making it their default search engine (and often removing "Google.com" completely AND installing Firefox and making THAT their default browser). Not only is it fast and private, it gives the same Google search results, and doesn't blast users with stupid "G O O G L E" special event animations and mini games and associated junk. Oh, and it never insists you install Chrome for a so-called "better browsing experience" (yeah right; I will stick with Firefox, thank you very much).
They have a mobile app too, but unfortunately, it seems slower AND there is no way [I have found] to make it the system default under Android (surprise, surprise).
DuckDuckGo is a well-known honeypot, operated by USIC. Their entire claim of privacy is based on "just trust us!!"