I've been doing a lot of reading about DDG since this dropped and ad blocking, a major privacy factor, was not included, and simply, I don't trust DDG anymore. If they were willing to disregard user privacy once, chances are they'll do it again. Hell, I'd bet they already are.
this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2023
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I think Duck Duck Go has been doomed to be subservient to Microsoft's whims ever since Google blocked them from aggregating search results from Google's index. Now the only way to run a private search engine is to use a private index like Xng or Metager. Of those, I'd rexommens Xng
I've had a private SearXNG instance for about a year. Never going back, if you want no ads and to not be tracked by your searches it's the way to go. I host it on a cloud server to further remove myself from being tracked via IP. It's pretty easy to spin one up and I highly recommend it.
But is a private instance really that private? Because all your searches must be bundled together and perhaps some of those searches include personal data. I am asking as it is something I have genuinely thought about for some time
Every time it makes a query to one of the selected search engines it does it as a "new user" so there's no history for it to track.
edit: that's also why I host it on a cloud server, just to add that extra layer. Not to say someone determined couldn't figure out who I am but it stops the passive layers of trying to track.
Your server might query search engines with a clean slate, but the search engine has its own history for your cloud server's IP address. Cookies aren't the only thing big tech use to track users.
or do you use multiple IP addresses?
I have it set to dynamic IP so it changes
I actually just set up my very own SearXNG instance and oh my god it easily smokes every search engine I've used in the past decade or so out of the water. And it doesn't even need much in terms of resources!! I'm spending $6/mo on Digital Cloud's cheapest option, and it all just works flawlessly!
Thanks for the shoutout!
How do you feel about paid search like Kagi? I’ve been using it and think it’s great. No tracking, apparently.
I haven't even heard of it so I don't have an opinion on it. If it works for you then great! Technically my private searxng is a paid service since I host it in the cloud but it does have the option to be free if you host it locally.
I'll also add, with a private instance of searxng you know for a fact nothing is getting saved.
Great qualities, I'll give it a try thank you!
I pay $5 a month to host my own instance of SearXNG on a 1GB Linode server. I am in full control of the server and the source code running it since it's completely open software. I don't have to trust that Kagi is being honest and fear that one day it comes out that they did something stupid like leak my billing address or sell my data through some convoluted legalese change to their terms of service.
Additionally I get access to search results from Bing, Google, DuckDuckGo, and any other provider I want, all without having anything about me or my activity tied to some kind of centralized identity/payment.
I like the sound of it! Kagi is working well for me, but will consider trying this out very soon.
*While using edge as the rendering engine
Which unless they're using the old/deprecated Edge engine (I don't even think that is possible), they're basically using Blink/Chromium which I find to be a bit ironic.
I wonder if it would've been possible for them to use Firefox's Gecko engine instead, but I don't know how feasible that idea is.
I wonder if it would’ve been possible for them to use Firefox’s Gecko engine instead, but I don’t know how feasible that idea is.
Considering that Firefox is actually FOSS unlike Chromium, there's absolutely no reason they couldn't have done this. They likely made this choice because it was the easiest, as everyone else is already using Chromium so there's plenty of existing reference material.
If you want a search engine that you can actually control and maintain privacy, while also still having access to DDG, Google, and Bing search results, check out SearXNG.
I host my own instance on a $5/month Linode, so in effect I'm paying $5/month to have completely private search without any influence from corporate overlords.
from the article "utilizes the Blink rendering engine"
when googled you find "Blink is the name of the rendering engine used by Chromium"
so edge rendering engine? not looking like it.
Edge is also Chromium now, so this is technically correct lol. There are literally three browsers in existence right now: Firefox, Safari, and then the 100 faces of Chromium
There's a fair bit of skepticism about DDG in here, and I've heard it before, but I feel like a lot of people are being pretty unfair to them. Are there search engines that don't ultimately use Google or Bing? Yes, there are. Are they good? It depends on what you mean by that.
It takes enormous resources to index even "most" of the internet on a rapid, ongoing basis. This is the main reason why Google and Bing overall provide the most thorough results. The only independent search engine I would trust is perhaps Neeva, because it's subscription-based. An engine claiming to be as thorough as Bing or Google that doesn't take money directly from you is up to something.
A lot of what DDG is trying to do with its browser and search-ancillary features is find some way of making money because they have to pay Microsoft for Bing results.
It's worth thinking about what our expectations are for search engines. If they must be free, but also not ad-supported and data-gathering... How can they afford to exist?
I'm surprised they are just now releasing a browser for PC. They had one for IOS and Android for years, with the only thing available for desktop users was a browser extension.
Same; especially with how everyone and their dog is releasing a Chrom{e,ium} reskin.
When are the Firefox forks gonna get popular? We need browser diversity as a fear of mine is that google will make chromium closed source and poof! More than half of the completing browsers are gone!
They're unlikely to do that as keeping Chromium source available helps them to ward off antitrust legislation. They can hold it up and say "See, look at all these competitors!" when in reality they're all just Googles agenda in different skins. Meanwhile they get to continue dictating the web standards to cater to their profit motives by maintaining dominance over the rendering engine space.
If you care about a free and open web, Firefox is the only morally correct choice. Anything else is just capitulating to Googles dominance over the ecosystem.
I've been happy to see a few webkit browsers on Mac recently (like SigmaOS). Hoping others follow suit since that team seems to be doing good work again
Being built on Windows' own rendering engine, it's largely relying on Windows' own updates to keep it secure.
I wonder if this is because of their ads partnership they have with Microsoft atm, they kept that avenue open by relying on their engines and security updates??
It's the same on macOS too, using Webkit, and they released that first.
It's built on Blink, which is Google's rendering engine. Trident, the rendering engine Microsoft created died when they gave up on Edge.
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