With news of DuckDuckGo being a Microsoft spy, good reminder of the existence of Ecosia, the search engine that plants trees.
@pimoore ironically I think maybe MS (although dont quote me on that). The way I see it, since we're giving MS our search data might as well plant some trees in the process....
@kaa Wikipedia: "Ecosia's search results have been provided by Microsoft Bing since 2017, and enhanced by the company's own algorithms."
@mcg That’s what I don’t understand though. Since DDG uses Bing search, how could the tracking not be on the web as well?
@pimoore I don’t believe this is about search results at all. Think of an app like 1Blocker that can block ads and trackers from websites. DuckDuckGo’s app is as browser with built in ad/tracker blocker, which makes an exception for Microsoft trackers. So once you click a search result on DuckDuckGo, in their iOS browser, you are visible to Microsoft, but your searches are still private because DuckDuckGo can block them on their own site. That’s at least how I understand it… could very well be wrong.
@humdrum That’s a good point, and I suppose my combination of 1Blocker and NextDNS would likely block the trackers. Still leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth, and is enough for me to move on from DDG. I hate when smarmy corporate interests and dishonest tactics always ruin us having nice things.
@pimoore You kinda have to believe what DDG says on the privacy policy for search. They make claims they don’t send your IP to backend search providers. Using something like Private Relay helps mitigate that even. With the DDG browser tho, they allowed tracking on pages anywhere that had MS tracking. Not great.
@mcg …sigh. Duck Duck Go was my go-to. Sounds like now it’s duck duck gone. Where did everyone learn about this? I still haven’t seen it mentioned in any of my newsfeeds.
@kaa what other search engines do you recommend? I think I read somewhere that Startpage was worth checking out.
@UndamnedOne Yes I do, and happily so even though I don’t exceed the free tier last I checked. I love the service and am more than willing to support it.
@UndamnedOne @kaa I recently read Startpage is partnered with an advertising company, so that’s an unfortunate dealbreaker for me.
@mcg Forgot about private relay, that’s definitely another line of defence. At the end of the day though, along with other services I can’t support in good conscience, DDG has added themselves to the list with this debacle.
@pimoore I don't see the relevance if you don't use the ddg app. I'd bet all the other search engines either have worse service or do more crappy stuff
@pimoore I think the important thing with things like search engines and browser engines where one actor stands for most of it, the single most important thing is to not use a chrome based browser or google search; and for social media to not use Facebook services. The rest is details
@pimoore @UndamnedOne I have no idea....clearly the DDG fiasco shows how important search data really is. If nobody feels there is a business there, then I'll stick with Ecosia, at least then we get some trees 🤷🏻♂️
@pimoore @mcg @UndamnedOne @kaa I use Mojeek.com a privacy search engine which actually has it's own index which is very rare in the search engine world. The downside is their index is smaller although growing, which at times can be an advantage since they othen surface alternate websites that get buried on Google or Bing powered search.
I use them because I think it is important to support a search engine that has it's own index and respects privacy even if it takes just a bit more effort.
@bradenslen @pimoore @kaa @UndamnedOne Just seeing these replies, seems like notifications aren’t working still. Anyhow, similar feelings about supporting independent indexes. Brave Search claims to serve most results from it’s own index, just wish they’d get out of the crypto space. Kagi is another, that uses Bing, but is also building its own index(see www.teclis.com). They are also planning a pay for search model, which will be a hard sell, unfortunately.