DuckDuckGo faces controversy over tracking agreement with Microsoft(metro.co.uk)
metro.co.uk
DuckDuckGo faces controversy over tracking agreement with Microsoft
https://metro.co.uk/2022/05/27/private-browser-duckduckgo-found-to-actually-be-tracking-users-16722038/
134 comments
Hi, I'm the CEO & Founder of DuckDuckGo. To be clear (since I see a ton of confusion going around about this story), when you load our search results, you are anonymous, including ads. That is, this news cycle is not about our search engine, it's about our browsers -- and, contrary to the headlines, we actually do restrict Microsoft trackers there today a great deal, and more than the major browsers do.
When most other browsers on the market talk about tracking protection they are referring to 3rd-party cookie protection e.g., blocking them) and fingerprinting protection (i.e., restricting APIS scripts can use), and our browsers impose these restrictions on all third-party tracking scripts, including those from Microsoft. We also have a lot of other web protections that also apply to Microsoft scripts (and everyone else) that most browsers don't do, including Global Privacy Control, 1st-party cookie expiration, referrer header trimming, new cookie consent handling (in our Mac beta), fire button (one-click) data clearing, and more.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. See for yourself the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
This web protection is a particular challenge to get right because websites can easily break when scripts that they depend on don't load, but because it makes for better privacy and faster page loads, we've taken it on while still trying to not break sites. As a result, it is far from perfect, as we can't block all scripts do to persistent breakage issues (which we try to workaround), and domains change all the time (and we continuously crawl sites looking for new tracking domains).
Though because we're doing this protection where we can, and also offer many other unique protections (e.g., Google AMP protection, smarter HTTPS upgrading, tracking protection for other apps in Android, email protection to block trackers for emails sent to your regular inbox, etc.), users get way more privacy protection with our app than they would using other browsers. Our goal has always been and remains to provide the most privacy we can in one download. And we have a lot more planned.
The issue at hand is all of our web protections apply to Microsoft scripts on 3rd-party sites (again, this is off of DuckDuckGo.com, i.e., not related to search) except this one around full content blocking, as we are currently contractually restricted by Microsoft there. However, this limited contractual restriction (about this one web protection) is the only one we have, and we have been and are working with them as we speak to reduce or remove it.
I understand this is all rather confusing because it is a search syndication contract that is preventing us from doing a non-search thing. That's because our product is a bundle of multiple privacy protections, and this is a distribution requirement imposed on us as part of the search syndication agreement that helps us privately use Bing results to provide you with better private search results overall. While a lot of what you see on our results page privately incorporates content from other sources (including our own indexes), e.g., Wikipedia, local listings, sports, stocks, lyrics, weather, quick answers, etc., etc., we source most of our traditional links and images privately from Bing (though because of other search technology our link and image results still may look different). Really only two companies (Google and Microsoft) have a high-quality global web link index (because I believe it costs upwards of a billion dollars a year to do), and so literally every other global search engine that wants to offer a search product competitive with Google for mainstream users, needs to bootstrap with one or both of them. The same is true for maps btw -- only the biggest companies can similarly afford to accurately map every neighborhood. And we are still a very small company relative to these companies -- literally on the order of 1,000 times smaller.
Anyway, I hope this provides some helpful context. I understand why people are upset with us on this, and we will do better. We're working on updates to our app store descriptions and other materials.
(Also FYI -- this was discussed extensively at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31490515). This is also a somewhat misleading title since it's not about our search engine, which people would assume, and also as noted above Microsoft scripts are actually restricted in our browser a lot, so I would suggest changing it.)
When most other browsers on the market talk about tracking protection they are referring to 3rd-party cookie protection e.g., blocking them) and fingerprinting protection (i.e., restricting APIS scripts can use), and our browsers impose these restrictions on all third-party tracking scripts, including those from Microsoft. We also have a lot of other web protections that also apply to Microsoft scripts (and everyone else) that most browsers don't do, including Global Privacy Control, 1st-party cookie expiration, referrer header trimming, new cookie consent handling (in our Mac beta), fire button (one-click) data clearing, and more.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. See for yourself the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
This web protection is a particular challenge to get right because websites can easily break when scripts that they depend on don't load, but because it makes for better privacy and faster page loads, we've taken it on while still trying to not break sites. As a result, it is far from perfect, as we can't block all scripts do to persistent breakage issues (which we try to workaround), and domains change all the time (and we continuously crawl sites looking for new tracking domains).
Though because we're doing this protection where we can, and also offer many other unique protections (e.g., Google AMP protection, smarter HTTPS upgrading, tracking protection for other apps in Android, email protection to block trackers for emails sent to your regular inbox, etc.), users get way more privacy protection with our app than they would using other browsers. Our goal has always been and remains to provide the most privacy we can in one download. And we have a lot more planned.
The issue at hand is all of our web protections apply to Microsoft scripts on 3rd-party sites (again, this is off of DuckDuckGo.com, i.e., not related to search) except this one around full content blocking, as we are currently contractually restricted by Microsoft there. However, this limited contractual restriction (about this one web protection) is the only one we have, and we have been and are working with them as we speak to reduce or remove it.
I understand this is all rather confusing because it is a search syndication contract that is preventing us from doing a non-search thing. That's because our product is a bundle of multiple privacy protections, and this is a distribution requirement imposed on us as part of the search syndication agreement that helps us privately use Bing results to provide you with better private search results overall. While a lot of what you see on our results page privately incorporates content from other sources (including our own indexes), e.g., Wikipedia, local listings, sports, stocks, lyrics, weather, quick answers, etc., etc., we source most of our traditional links and images privately from Bing (though because of other search technology our link and image results still may look different). Really only two companies (Google and Microsoft) have a high-quality global web link index (because I believe it costs upwards of a billion dollars a year to do), and so literally every other global search engine that wants to offer a search product competitive with Google for mainstream users, needs to bootstrap with one or both of them. The same is true for maps btw -- only the biggest companies can similarly afford to accurately map every neighborhood. And we are still a very small company relative to these companies -- literally on the order of 1,000 times smaller.
Anyway, I hope this provides some helpful context. I understand why people are upset with us on this, and we will do better. We're working on updates to our app store descriptions and other materials.
(Also FYI -- this was discussed extensively at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31490515). This is also a somewhat misleading title since it's not about our search engine, which people would assume, and also as noted above Microsoft scripts are actually restricted in our browser a lot, so I would suggest changing it.)
So many words to minimize what happened, makes the conclusion of "I understand why people are upset with us on this" seem a little insincere.
To me, this is really simple. You entered a contract that allowed a company to circumvent tracking protections. the extent and which product this happened on are only semantic details. It fundamentally undermines your trustworthiness as a supposedly privacy-oriented company.
To me, this is really simple. You entered a contract that allowed a company to circumvent tracking protections. the extent and which product this happened on are only semantic details. It fundamentally undermines your trustworthiness as a supposedly privacy-oriented company.
I am very sincere about this and I understand we have to do a lot more to rebuild trust. I also understand that will take a lot of time.
I do think the details matter though because based on the comments across the web, most people seeing this news cycle are coming to false conclusions, e.g., that this is about our search engine (it's not), that we give 3rd-party Microsoft scripts a free pass on 3rd-party websites (we don't), that we don't block 3rd-party cookies in our browsers (we do), or that any of the major browsers offer better web protection (they don't, and in fact they don't even attempt this particular type of protection).
Unfortunately this takes a few paragraphs to unpack fully. Probably someone else can explain it better and more succinctly, but I'm trying my best here to be succint.
I do think the details matter though because based on the comments across the web, most people seeing this news cycle are coming to false conclusions, e.g., that this is about our search engine (it's not), that we give 3rd-party Microsoft scripts a free pass on 3rd-party websites (we don't), that we don't block 3rd-party cookies in our browsers (we do), or that any of the major browsers offer better web protection (they don't, and in fact they don't even attempt this particular type of protection).
Unfortunately this takes a few paragraphs to unpack fully. Probably someone else can explain it better and more succinctly, but I'm trying my best here to be succint.
> This is also a somewhat misleading title since it's not about our search engine, which people would assume
I understand the controversy (or at least I think I do), and I also respect what you're trying to explain.
But if DuckDuckGo has to have a browser (instead of simply recommending to its users to change their default search engine on their current browser), then that browser needs to live up to its promises, and also to very high standards.
On the current page for the DDG browser [1] it says at the top:
> Seamlessly take control of your personal information, no matter where the Internet takes you.
If this means anything, it means the DDG browser blocks all trackers, always, in all places, no?
[1] https://duckduckgo.com/app
I understand the controversy (or at least I think I do), and I also respect what you're trying to explain.
But if DuckDuckGo has to have a browser (instead of simply recommending to its users to change their default search engine on their current browser), then that browser needs to live up to its promises, and also to very high standards.
On the current page for the DDG browser [1] it says at the top:
> Seamlessly take control of your personal information, no matter where the Internet takes you.
If this means anything, it means the DDG browser blocks all trackers, always, in all places, no?
[1] https://duckduckgo.com/app
No browser can provide 100% protection if for no other reason than the tracker landscape is constantly evolving as it works to evade our protections. We will re-evaluate our marketing messages, though as a comparison look at how the major browsers market their tracking protections and yet do not even attempt to provide any script blocking, let alone have major holes in their cookie protection (see https://privacytests.org/).
> the tracker landscape is constantly evolving
Sure. But this is usually addressed by filter lists.
> see https://privacytests.org/
Very interesting link, thanks. Didn't know that localStorage and sessionStorage could be read across domains!
But the comparison should include (browser)+uBlock Origin. I wonder if there are many users who care about privacy and don't install uBlock Origin by default.
Edit: added Origin to avoid confusion.
Sure. But this is usually addressed by filter lists.
> see https://privacytests.org/
Very interesting link, thanks. Didn't know that localStorage and sessionStorage could be read across domains!
But the comparison should include (browser)+uBlock Origin. I wonder if there are many users who care about privacy and don't install uBlock Origin by default.
Edit: added Origin to avoid confusion.
> If this means anything, it means the DDG browser blocks all trackers, always, in all places, no?
You've created a completely unrealistic standard. Nothing meets the standard of blocking all trackers everywhere as that isn't possible today or in the foreseeable future.
You've created a completely unrealistic standard. Nothing meets the standard of blocking all trackers everywhere as that isn't possible today or in the foreseeable future.
Well then, they shouldn't promise what they can't deliver.
Also, I don't think that's true. And it's part of the problem with the current DDG defense. They have an agreement with MS to not block 3rd party trackers, and they say "in any case it's very difficult to do and nobody else even tries to do it".
It's a misdirection.
Also, I don't think that's true. And it's part of the problem with the current DDG defense. They have an agreement with MS to not block 3rd party trackers, and they say "in any case it's very difficult to do and nobody else even tries to do it".
It's a misdirection.
> Also, I don't think that's true.
The best tools like uBlock, Umatrix, Privacy Badger, etc. all miss plenty of trackers, but not for a lack of trying. A complete solution doesn't exist today, nor is there anything promising on the horizon that I'm aware of. I am very curious to know the source of your optimism (I don't have much at the moment).
> They have an agreement with MS to not block 3rd party trackers, and they say "in any case it's very difficult to do and nobody else even tries to do it". It's a misdirection.
They shouldn't have done that to be sure, they've said as much, and are paying the price. They also said that future agreements won't include that carve out. They screwed up and will hopefully learn a valuable lesson from all this.
I will say, you should have used more precise language and said something like, "they have an agreement to not block 3rd party trackers in their browser" (emphasis mine). Your statement suggests that they don't block those sorts of things across their entire line of products, which isn't true. You're adding to the confusion by using overly broad language that is not precise and not 100% truly accurate.
Finally, I'm not aware of anything that is widely available that is as good privacy-wise as DDG and is actually usable by the most people. Until something exists that's just as good privacy-wise and is somewhat useful, I see very little choice but to use DDG. We'll see how DDG behaves in the coming months and years. Long term, they really should figure out something besides ads as a business model, since the incentives don't align with privacy.
The best tools like uBlock, Umatrix, Privacy Badger, etc. all miss plenty of trackers, but not for a lack of trying. A complete solution doesn't exist today, nor is there anything promising on the horizon that I'm aware of. I am very curious to know the source of your optimism (I don't have much at the moment).
> They have an agreement with MS to not block 3rd party trackers, and they say "in any case it's very difficult to do and nobody else even tries to do it". It's a misdirection.
They shouldn't have done that to be sure, they've said as much, and are paying the price. They also said that future agreements won't include that carve out. They screwed up and will hopefully learn a valuable lesson from all this.
I will say, you should have used more precise language and said something like, "they have an agreement to not block 3rd party trackers in their browser" (emphasis mine). Your statement suggests that they don't block those sorts of things across their entire line of products, which isn't true. You're adding to the confusion by using overly broad language that is not precise and not 100% truly accurate.
Finally, I'm not aware of anything that is widely available that is as good privacy-wise as DDG and is actually usable by the most people. Until something exists that's just as good privacy-wise and is somewhat useful, I see very little choice but to use DDG. We'll see how DDG behaves in the coming months and years. Long term, they really should figure out something besides ads as a business model, since the incentives don't align with privacy.
This is a quote from you
“[W]hen you search, you expect unbiased results, but that’s not what you get on Google,” @matthewde_silva quotes @yegg"
Seems you're backtracked on being unbiased with the recent announcement of DuckDuckGo censoring sources on the back of the Ukrainian War. Any comment on that - seems like the bigger DDG gets, the further you stray from your initial values
https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1114524914227253249
“[W]hen you search, you expect unbiased results, but that’s not what you get on Google,” @matthewde_silva quotes @yegg"
Seems you're backtracked on being unbiased with the recent announcement of DuckDuckGo censoring sources on the back of the Ukrainian War. Any comment on that - seems like the bigger DDG gets, the further you stray from your initial values
https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1114524914227253249
No, there hasn't been any backtracking on this. The full quote continues "On Google, you get results tailored to what they think you’re likely to click on, based on the data profile they’ve built on you over time."
Unlike other search engines (like Google), we don’t alter search results based on someone’s previous search history. In fact, since we don’t track our users we don’t have access to search histories at all. Those other search engines show you results based on a data profile about you and your online activity (including your search history), and so can be slanted towards what they think you will click on the most based on this profiling. This effect is commonly known as the search filter bubble, but using DuckDuckGo can help you escape it.
This does not mean our search results are generally “unfiltered” because, for every search you make online, a search engine’s job is to filter millions of possible results down to a ranked order of just a handful. In other words, a search engine has to use algorithms programmed by people to determine what shows up first in the list of results, what shows up second, and so on. Otherwise, for every search you’d just get a completely random set of results, which of course wouldn’t be very useful.
However, we do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner, and not based on my politics (or anyone's for that matter). I left another comment here on how that works: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557837
Unlike other search engines (like Google), we don’t alter search results based on someone’s previous search history. In fact, since we don’t track our users we don’t have access to search histories at all. Those other search engines show you results based on a data profile about you and your online activity (including your search history), and so can be slanted towards what they think you will click on the most based on this profiling. This effect is commonly known as the search filter bubble, but using DuckDuckGo can help you escape it.
This does not mean our search results are generally “unfiltered” because, for every search you make online, a search engine’s job is to filter millions of possible results down to a ranked order of just a handful. In other words, a search engine has to use algorithms programmed by people to determine what shows up first in the list of results, what shows up second, and so on. Otherwise, for every search you’d just get a completely random set of results, which of course wouldn’t be very useful.
However, we do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner, and not based on my politics (or anyone's for that matter). I left another comment here on how that works: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557837
Your last statement directly contradicts your tweet on March 10th.
"Like so many others I am sickened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the gigantic humanitarian crisis it continues to create. #StandWithUkraine
At DuckDuckGo, we've been rolling out search updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation."
We get it - you are making these moves because of financial reasons or political pressure....but don't try and play to both sides with the corporate speak.
https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318
"Like so many others I am sickened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the gigantic humanitarian crisis it continues to create. #StandWithUkraine
At DuckDuckGo, we've been rolling out search updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation."
We get it - you are making these moves because of financial reasons or political pressure....but don't try and play to both sides with the corporate speak.
https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318
No it doesn't. Here's the comment in full:
** We actually do not intentionally censor any news results, meaning media outlets are not being removed or their stories displayed so far down in the results they are effectively removed. That is, unless legally prohibited, you should find all media outlets in our results, and they should generally show on top if you search for them by name or domain name. If you are seeing otherwise, please let me know and we will investigate.
A search engine's primary job is to rank results, trying to put results that most quickly and accurately answer the query on top. We do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner. Ranking for news-related searches is particularly difficult because for most news stories there are often hundreds of media outlets covering the same story, many with similar relevancy in terms of keyword matching and popularity. As such, we look to another ranking factor to ensure just the top of the results aren't taken by obviously very low-quality news results so that users have more sources of relevant, high-quality news results to compare and choose between.
The non-partisan factor we've found to help accomplish this is a rare, but well-documented history of a site's complete lack of news reporting standards, such as routinely using spam or clickbait to artificially inflate traffic, consistently publishing stories without citing sources, censoring stories due to operating with very limited press freedom, or misleading readers about who owns, funds, and authors stories for the site. And since we do not censor sites, even state-sponsored media in countries with very limited press freedom, these sites will still show up in results, and even on top like when you search for them directly. **
With that context, RT is a media outlet with "very limited press freedom" where journalists must censor their articles or else face jail time, or worse. And RT still shows up in our results, and on top if you search for it directly, e.g., https://duckduckgo.com/?q=rt+ukraine&ia=web
** We actually do not intentionally censor any news results, meaning media outlets are not being removed or their stories displayed so far down in the results they are effectively removed. That is, unless legally prohibited, you should find all media outlets in our results, and they should generally show on top if you search for them by name or domain name. If you are seeing otherwise, please let me know and we will investigate.
A search engine's primary job is to rank results, trying to put results that most quickly and accurately answer the query on top. We do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner. Ranking for news-related searches is particularly difficult because for most news stories there are often hundreds of media outlets covering the same story, many with similar relevancy in terms of keyword matching and popularity. As such, we look to another ranking factor to ensure just the top of the results aren't taken by obviously very low-quality news results so that users have more sources of relevant, high-quality news results to compare and choose between.
The non-partisan factor we've found to help accomplish this is a rare, but well-documented history of a site's complete lack of news reporting standards, such as routinely using spam or clickbait to artificially inflate traffic, consistently publishing stories without citing sources, censoring stories due to operating with very limited press freedom, or misleading readers about who owns, funds, and authors stories for the site. And since we do not censor sites, even state-sponsored media in countries with very limited press freedom, these sites will still show up in results, and even on top like when you search for them directly. **
With that context, RT is a media outlet with "very limited press freedom" where journalists must censor their articles or else face jail time, or worse. And RT still shows up in our results, and on top if you search for it directly, e.g., https://duckduckgo.com/?q=rt+ukraine&ia=web
The concern comes down to how that evaluation of a website is made. It’s the same way people can’t really accept fact checkers because “who fact checks the fact checkers?” With the news ranking it is who evaluates the evaluators. Without an option for users to switch off the part of the algorithm that includes evaluating for journalistic truth (as I will summarize those non partisan factor’s goal) people will always feel like the possibility of manipulation will always be there.
> And RT still shows up in our results, and on top if you search for it directly, e.g
Strange, but RT does not show up in DDG for me. Not by using your link, not even by searching "Russia Today" on it. The first results I get are Al Jazeera or Fox News. No Russia Today at all. How's that?
Strange, but RT does not show up in DDG for me. Not by using your link, not even by searching "Russia Today" on it. The first results I get are Al Jazeera or Fox News. No Russia Today at all. How's that?
If you are in the EU, distributing RT (and Sputnik News) is banned in the EU, e.g., see https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/eu-sanctions-google-searc...
I'm in the EU, yes, but I don't understand that either. Because there are search engines, freely available in the EU, that didn't honour that questionable request about banning websites.
So, for me, DDG is hiding some results while other search engines that I can use in the EU, do not.
So, for me, DDG is hiding some results while other search engines that I can use in the EU, do not.
If that's the case, why would you accede to the EU's demands? Would you geoblock search results in China if the CCP deemed certain content or content providers illegal?
We are banned in China and have no assets there.
You're splitting hairs when you say down ranking is not censorship - you know full well the impact to a websites traffic once it gets out of the top 3 results let along the 1st page of results.
The fact you started censoring "Russian media outlets" right after the start of the war shows the political nature of your decision, those "limited press freedoms" weren't a concern until Mar 22.
Do you publish the decision making process for how the "non-partisan" decisions on censorship are made - or is this another blackbox? I'm sure Dailymail, New York Post and Al Jazeera are all down-ranked too, considering they meet your "non-partisan factors" right?
The fact you started censoring "Russian media outlets" right after the start of the war shows the political nature of your decision, those "limited press freedoms" weren't a concern until Mar 22.
Do you publish the decision making process for how the "non-partisan" decisions on censorship are made - or is this another blackbox? I'm sure Dailymail, New York Post and Al Jazeera are all down-ranked too, considering they meet your "non-partisan factors" right?
> Really only two companies (Google and Microsoft) have a high-quality global web link index ...
Yandex and Baidu also have pretty good index, and perhaps would be even cheaper than Bing. I'd say they only lack in terms of the data (search queries, search result links clicked etc). It's just US protectionist policy (on behalf of the BigTech) at play here to avoid these services. Both Yandex and Baidu outperform Google when it comes to Russian and Chinese search queries, clearly indicating they are at par (or even better) than Google in terms of search algorithms. The only thing they lack is better data, and that's why they struggle with foreign search queries. (Though I find Yandex has improved a lot here, enough to make it my regular search engine).
Yandex and Baidu also have pretty good index, and perhaps would be even cheaper than Bing. I'd say they only lack in terms of the data (search queries, search result links clicked etc). It's just US protectionist policy (on behalf of the BigTech) at play here to avoid these services. Both Yandex and Baidu outperform Google when it comes to Russian and Chinese search queries, clearly indicating they are at par (or even better) than Google in terms of search algorithms. The only thing they lack is better data, and that's why they struggle with foreign search queries. (Though I find Yandex has improved a lot here, enough to make it my regular search engine).
LOL. Have you actually used Baidu? It is trash. Results are full of heavily SEO-ed sites and sites that grab other websites' content and present as if it's their own. I say this as someone who has used Baidu for many years, including before Google was forced to leave China in 2020.
No, I don't use Baidu as it performs poorly for english queries. From what I have read online, the popular sentiment is that Baidu is better than Google when it comes to chinese search queries. Ofcourse, like Google they have the monopoly advantage (atleast in China). Yandex, I do use daily - it's good with queries it knows about, but struggles with new / unknown queries (for e.g. when I search something geographically related or local, at which Google is obviously better because of its userbase).
"literally every other global search engine that wants to offer a search product competitive with Google for mainstream users, needs to bootstrap with one or both of them."
I don't want to read too far into the specific wording, but you mentioned "bootstrap" and this feels like a good opportunity to ask the question. Is DDG planning or thinking about how it might move towards it's own index for general results? I feel like most of the criticism DDG receives these days is because it's backed by another, less privacy concerned, mega-corp. While it may not be something that's feasible today, and not in it's entirety, are there moves being made towards building an independent global web link index?
I don't want to read too far into the specific wording, but you mentioned "bootstrap" and this feels like a good opportunity to ask the question. Is DDG planning or thinking about how it might move towards it's own index for general results? I feel like most of the criticism DDG receives these days is because it's backed by another, less privacy concerned, mega-corp. While it may not be something that's feasible today, and not in it's entirety, are there moves being made towards building an independent global web link index?
[deleted]
It should be said that, if I understand it correctly, these worries are about the DDG browser, not their search, which is what most people (myself included) associate with them and care about.
The worries are about brand and integrity, not any particular product. Either they are a privacy-focused company or they are not.
If RMS took a job with Adobe, do you think people would question his commitment to open source?
If RMS took a job with Adobe, do you think people would question his commitment to open source?
I get your point but I can't help being obstinate; RMS is not committed to open source.
Yes, I (CEO/Founder, DuckDuckGo) left a top-level comment responding to the article here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557587. Would suggest reading it for a fuller explanation.
In short though, you're right it isn't about our search engine. It also isn't about 3rd-party cookies (another point of confusion I've seen), which our browsers block (including for 3rd-party Microsoft scripts). 3rd-party Microsoft scripts are also further restricted in our browsers with additional web protections, e.g., fingerprinting protection, Global Privacy Control, referrer header trimming, etc.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
In short though, you're right it isn't about our search engine. It also isn't about 3rd-party cookies (another point of confusion I've seen), which our browsers block (including for 3rd-party Microsoft scripts). 3rd-party Microsoft scripts are also further restricted in our browsers with additional web protections, e.g., fingerprinting protection, Global Privacy Control, referrer header trimming, etc.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
doesn't matter, IMO. Playing favorites is a bad look for a privacy focused company, and it lowers trust in your products across the board.
It does. Don't let the best to be an enemy of the good. World is not painted in black and white, it isn't even in shades of gray. Even colors of rainbow wouldn't be enough, because they can be mixed in the real world. Black and white is such an oversimplification, that it is surprising that there are cases when it works.
Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.
So far they are being transparent. If you were a DDG user, you should keep supporting them for now and see where it takes us. There aren’t many tech companies that are privacy focused. And so far I think it’s in our best interest that privacy first becomes mainstream.
So far they are being transparent. If you were a DDG user, you should keep supporting them for now and see where it takes us. There aren’t many tech companies that are privacy focused. And so far I think it’s in our best interest that privacy first becomes mainstream.
IMO this is too big a misstep to play that card. if your support is too unconditional, you may end up with privacy theather instead of privacy. but we shall see what the future holds
They are not transparent. Show me where they indicated that their policies did not apply to Microsoft cookies before journalists highlighted the issue.
As said, this isn't about 3rd-party cookies, which our browsers block wholesale (including for 3rd-party Microsoft scripts). 3rd-party Microsoft scripts are also further restricted in our browsers with additional web protections, e.g., fingerprinting protection, Global Privacy Control, referrer header trimming, etc.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html (scroll to the very bottom).
I understand why people are upset with us on this, and we will do better. I know we have to do a lot more to rebuild trust, and I also understand that will not happen overnight. Our goal remains though to provide the most privacy we can in one download.
(For anyone wanting full context and a more detailed explanation, please see linked comment mentioned above -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557587.
(For anyone wanting full context and a more detailed explanation, please see linked comment mentioned above -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557587.
> I understand why people are upset with us on this, and we will do better. I know we have to do a lot more to rebuild trust, and I also understand that will not happen overnight. Our goal remains though to provide the most privacy we can in one download.
I don't believe you actually understand why people are upset with this -- it shows in the replies. You also don't seem to understand your users. It appears that you're entirely convinced that others are just misunderstanding you and that's why they don't see the genius/cleverness/importance/validity --whatever, in the actions DDG has carried out over the last months.
In all honesty, it feels like you're moving the company towards acquisition and looking for an exit.
I don't believe you actually understand why people are upset with this -- it shows in the replies. You also don't seem to understand your users. It appears that you're entirely convinced that others are just misunderstanding you and that's why they don't see the genius/cleverness/importance/validity --whatever, in the actions DDG has carried out over the last months.
In all honesty, it feels like you're moving the company towards acquisition and looking for an exit.
Favorites? The answer is that this is a hard problem to solve and isn't just a Microsoft thing means it's not picking Favorites.
I don't understand what you mean. They entered a contractual agreement that prevented them from applying tracking protections to microsoft properties in some situations. How is that not picking favorites?
I think that's letting them off easy. Even if you don't care about their browser, their conduct in regards to the browser is a canary for their potential conduct regarding search and other products in the future. I think people are wrong to brush this off because it's "only about the browser"
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This. And it also should be said that the Metro.co.uk is quite garbage sensationalism .
I don't know many who use their browser, personally I moved over to Brave recently and so far so good.
I don't know many who use their browser, personally I moved over to Brave recently and so far so good.
This is actually a really classic use of the 'ad hominem' to try and reject the argument by attacking the source. I do agree that Metro is a bad source, however if you read the article, you'd find it's not actually that bad.
I say this because NPR was running the same angle yesterday, and several "more reputable" sources are reporting the same thing as well.
Frankly, for DDG to spend all this money blasting "we actually care about privacy" advertisements in radio and online, and then to play around like this, it's certainly dangerous. That advertising campaign is probably why news outlets are even discussing this. "You defined your brand standard, why shouldn't we hold you to it".
I'm sure their marketing folks are upset! All that money on a message, undone in a flash.
I say this because NPR was running the same angle yesterday, and several "more reputable" sources are reporting the same thing as well.
Frankly, for DDG to spend all this money blasting "we actually care about privacy" advertisements in radio and online, and then to play around like this, it's certainly dangerous. That advertising campaign is probably why news outlets are even discussing this. "You defined your brand standard, why shouldn't we hold you to it".
I'm sure their marketing folks are upset! All that money on a message, undone in a flash.
Metro is from the same group that brings you the daily mail, of course it's garbage
I use Brave's browser and search too.
Sad to hear that DDG lost it's integrity with this move.
Sad to hear that DDG lost it's integrity with this move.
To be honest, I would trust more DDG than Brave still.
Brave’s business model is based on ads which is very controversial, and that model always ends up compensating with the cost of user privacy.
Brave’s business model is based on ads which is very controversial, and that model always ends up compensating with the cost of user privacy.
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The business model of the internet is ads.
I switched to Kagi[0] when DDG announced their implementation of selective censorship[1]. The results are much better, and I use the !g bang way less often (for DDG I was basically always using it, making the bangs the only actually useful feature of DDG for me).
[0] https://kagi.com/
[1] https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318 — I think it's sad that I have to clarify that I am personally also sickened by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but that I don't want DDG to be an arbiter of truth despite that
[0] https://kagi.com/
[1] https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318 — I think it's sad that I have to clarify that I am personally also sickened by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but that I don't want DDG to be an arbiter of truth despite that
Calling what DDG did "selective censorship" is a very unfair description. Essentially a search engine is about sorting search results and any search engine must do that based on some idea about what information is good and what is bad. DDG has been doing that since day one. In fact, the primary reason DDG was created was because its creator thought they could improve search results by getting rid of things that showed up in Google that they thought where bad (the privacy selling point came later)[1]. You may disagree with some of these choices (which is fair) but calling them "censorship" is just using bad sounding words that don't really apply.
1: Source, Gabriel Weinberg's book Traction.
1: Source, Gabriel Weinberg's book Traction.
I fail to see how this could be called anything else without resorting to newspeak. It's politically motivated downranking of sources that the operators of DDG are in ideological disagreement with. It's a way of exerting narrative control over public perceptions.
Downranking sites that disrespect user privacy using trackers and similar is different, because it is not ideologically motivated. I guess you could call it censorship, but no-one except the site owners are going to take issue with it.
A simple way to tell if something is political censorship is to ask: who will take issue with the absence of this piece of information that is being removed or hidden? If the answer contains groups of people that aren't just corporations, I think it's pretty clear what is going on.
And I guess I have to repeat myself here: no, I don't personally belong to such a group in this context. I just happen to not want anyone telling me what I'm supposed to believe, even if I'm "on their side".
Downranking sites that disrespect user privacy using trackers and similar is different, because it is not ideologically motivated. I guess you could call it censorship, but no-one except the site owners are going to take issue with it.
A simple way to tell if something is political censorship is to ask: who will take issue with the absence of this piece of information that is being removed or hidden? If the answer contains groups of people that aren't just corporations, I think it's pretty clear what is going on.
And I guess I have to repeat myself here: no, I don't personally belong to such a group in this context. I just happen to not want anyone telling me what I'm supposed to believe, even if I'm "on their side".
As they said, you still have to sort top to bottom the results consistently. SEO "hacking" is a big problem, allowing sites to put themselves at the top even though they're not relevant to the search or are not the most common source of information that real users click on. You have to take action against those abuses by downranking. It just so happens that a big government, Russia, was caught doing this.
Just because it may be "political" doesn't give it special protection.
Just because it may be "political" doesn't give it special protection.
The core feature of their product is "we will discard all the data on the internet except 10 links". They already "censor" nearly everything.
It is completely reasonable to question their algorithms and processes. I don't see why Russian disinformation needs to be singled out given what is allowed in the corporate press every time the US starts a fight somewhere (can they please downrank all sociopath war mongers?). But while it may be political activism it isn't censorship. If you use DDG you ask for them to make judgement calls.
It is completely reasonable to question their algorithms and processes. I don't see why Russian disinformation needs to be singled out given what is allowed in the corporate press every time the US starts a fight somewhere (can they please downrank all sociopath war mongers?). But while it may be political activism it isn't censorship. If you use DDG you ask for them to make judgement calls.
Folks throw that word around so much that it's become neutral.
The people that use DDG overwhelmingly are not using it as a search engine to find Russian disinformation. This is literally a case of a business announcing that it's working to do its stated business activity, which is to provide relevant search results.
The people that use DDG overwhelmingly are not using it as a search engine to find Russian disinformation. This is literally a case of a business announcing that it's working to do its stated business activity, which is to provide relevant search results.
What he actually said: "At DuckDuckGo, we've been rolling out search updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation."
You may note what Microsoft had stated earlier [0] "We are removing RT news apps from our Windows app store and further de-ranking these sites’ search results on Bing so that it will only return RT and Sputnik links when a user clearly intends to navigate to those pages."
[0] https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2022/02/28/ukraine...
You may note what Microsoft had stated earlier [0] "We are removing RT news apps from our Windows app store and further de-ranking these sites’ search results on Bing so that it will only return RT and Sputnik links when a user clearly intends to navigate to those pages."
[0] https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2022/02/28/ukraine...
I'm just waiting for the day my flashlight starts deciding what to shine a light on based on my perceived intentions
I guess that will be the day that you buy a flashlight intended to rank and only light up the top 10 / 20 most relevant things?
It's like complaining about water making you wet.
It's like complaining about water making you wet.
Relevant to the flashlight you mean?
down ranking is basically throwing the results down the later pages which is the same as removing results, just doing it in a sneaky way.
and rating stuff as disinformation is censorship. i want my search engine to be like the internet, i.e. a conduit for bits, not a self righteous mind that controls what goes thru.
and rating stuff as disinformation is censorship. i want my search engine to be like the internet, i.e. a conduit for bits, not a self righteous mind that controls what goes thru.
But then you open yourself up entirely to being manipulated by the website owners. The Russian government has enough resources to artificially push their SEO way higher than it should be, and it's objectively lower quality information.
There isn't really a neutral option (no "conduit for bits") – you either let low quality, high resource sites flood your search results, or you try to filter for quality. Here, that choice is also aligned with a political choice.
There isn't really a neutral option (no "conduit for bits") – you either let low quality, high resource sites flood your search results, or you try to filter for quality. Here, that choice is also aligned with a political choice.
> The Russian government has enough resources to artificially push their SEO way higher than it should be,
country with low tier GDP has supposedly more resources to move SEO than the first or second tech powerhouse in the world? Hum. I smell bullshit here.
If I take your argument as valid I should worry about Spain next.
country with low tier GDP has supposedly more resources to move SEO than the first or second tech powerhouse in the world? Hum. I smell bullshit here.
If I take your argument as valid I should worry about Spain next.
Hi, CEO & Founder of DuckDuckGo here. I see a lot of confusion here too, we are not ranking based on my politics (or anyone's politics for that matter).
We actually do not intentionally censor any news results, meaning media outlets are not being removed or their stories displayed so far down in the results they are effectively removed. That is, unless legally prohibited, you should find all media outlets in our results, and they should generally show on top if you search for them by name or domain name. If you are seeing otherwise, please let me know and we will investigate.
A search engine's primary job is to rank results, trying to put results that most quickly and accurately answer the query on top. We do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner. Ranking for news-related searches is particularly difficult because for most news stories there are often hundreds of media outlets covering the same story, many with similar relevancy in terms of keyword matching and popularity. As such, we look to another ranking factor to ensure just the top of the results aren't taken by obviously very low-quality news results so that users have more sources of relevant, high-quality news results to compare and choose between.
The non-partisan factor we've found to help accomplish this is a rare, but well-documented history of a site's complete lack of news reporting standards, such as routinely using spam or clickbait to artificially inflate traffic, consistently publishing stories without citing sources, censoring stories due to operating with very limited press freedom, or misleading readers about who owns, funds, and authors stories for the site. And since we do not censor sites, even state-sponsored media in countries with very limited press freedom, these sites will still show up in results, and even on top like when you search for them directly.
We actually do not intentionally censor any news results, meaning media outlets are not being removed or their stories displayed so far down in the results they are effectively removed. That is, unless legally prohibited, you should find all media outlets in our results, and they should generally show on top if you search for them by name or domain name. If you are seeing otherwise, please let me know and we will investigate.
A search engine's primary job is to rank results, trying to put results that most quickly and accurately answer the query on top. We do this ranking in a strictly non-partisan manner. Ranking for news-related searches is particularly difficult because for most news stories there are often hundreds of media outlets covering the same story, many with similar relevancy in terms of keyword matching and popularity. As such, we look to another ranking factor to ensure just the top of the results aren't taken by obviously very low-quality news results so that users have more sources of relevant, high-quality news results to compare and choose between.
The non-partisan factor we've found to help accomplish this is a rare, but well-documented history of a site's complete lack of news reporting standards, such as routinely using spam or clickbait to artificially inflate traffic, consistently publishing stories without citing sources, censoring stories due to operating with very limited press freedom, or misleading readers about who owns, funds, and authors stories for the site. And since we do not censor sites, even state-sponsored media in countries with very limited press freedom, these sites will still show up in results, and even on top like when you search for them directly.
> The non-partisan factor we've found to help accomplish this is a rare, but well-documented history of a site's complete lack of news reporting standards, such as routinely using spam or clickbait to artificially inflate traffic, consistently publishing stories without citing sources, censoring stories due to operating with very limited press freedom, or misleading readers about who owns, funds, and authors stories for the site.
Do you publish these scorecards publicly?
If there is no transparency, we cannot assume your assessment is non-partisan.
Do you publish these scorecards publicly?
If there is no transparency, we cannot assume your assessment is non-partisan.
I love what you're been fighting for and it's great that you're on here. I'd even accept you accepting MS tracking cookies if you're transparent about it - you have to make money and I'd rather you stay in business. But I can't see anything from this post or the answers you gave to the metro specifically refuting this [1]: "The new @DuckDuckGo browsers for iOS/Android don't block Microsoft data flows, for LinkedIn or Bing"
[1]: https://twitter.com/thezedwards/status/1528808759027331072I actually left a top-level comment on this post that responds to the article in depth here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557587. To be clear, though, we do block Microsoft 3rd-party cookies and their scripts are also further restricted in our browsers with additional web protections, e.g., fingerprinting protection, Global Privacy Control, referrer header trimming, etc.
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html
What this article is talking about specifically is one web protection that the major browsers don't even attempt to do — stopping third-party tracking scripts from even loading on third-party websites. You can see that for yourself at the bottom 'tracker content blocking' section of this audit site: https://privacytests.org/ios.html
This is doublespeak cover for censorship. The corporate media uses the same buzzwords about quality to obfuscate their serving of the Kabal’s agenda.
A wise man from Texas once said: Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice... can’t be fooled again.
A wise man from Texas once said: Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice... can’t be fooled again.
Seriously, try kagi. Its better.
Are you suggesting to the CEO and founder of DDG to try Kagi?
Even though Kagi looks and sound nice, I can't cope with signed-in-required search.
I understand that their business model is "you pay, you are our user, we won't sell your data"[1] But there is a simple privacy-friendly business model to be made with free anonymous search engine as well, when you look for "horses" we show you ads of horses. This is what Duckduckgo Search and Google Search both do. (Well google then runs ads on many website which are then linked to your search query, that's the real issue)
Now with Kagi, I have a company which knows all my darkest secrets whether I use a different computer behind a VPN or not.
[1] https://kagi.com/faq#privacy
I understand that their business model is "you pay, you are our user, we won't sell your data"[1] But there is a simple privacy-friendly business model to be made with free anonymous search engine as well, when you look for "horses" we show you ads of horses. This is what Duckduckgo Search and Google Search both do. (Well google then runs ads on many website which are then linked to your search query, that's the real issue)
Now with Kagi, I have a company which knows all my darkest secrets whether I use a different computer behind a VPN or not.
[1] https://kagi.com/faq#privacy
True, there should be an anony way to prove that you've paid. That would solve the issue.
Mullvad VPN does this when you pay with cash.
That's exactly the kind of "censorship" you want. I understand the sentiment, but you couldn't have chosen a worst example, I hope it's not this specific instance of censorship that really troubles you. Removing what is objectively, yes, spam is ok.
People complain about search engines being full of garbage and clearly false info, then complain that DDG took action against sources that publish false info. Can’t win.
What makes you trust Kagi more than DDG? Is their crawling/ranking algo open source?
No, I only have their word to go on, but at least they explicitly say that they are avoiding censorship[0], while DDG are quite open with it.
I also did some smell tests by searching controversial topics, and Kagi does seem to present a more mixed bag of sources than DDG and Google on the first page of results.
[0] https://kagi.com/faq#censoring
I also did some smell tests by searching controversial topics, and Kagi does seem to present a more mixed bag of sources than DDG and Google on the first page of results.
[0] https://kagi.com/faq#censoring
How is a mixed bag of sources a good thing? A collection of reputable sources would be better. There's no such thing as neutral however breitbart and fox news (both of whom I've seen come up in searching) actively spread disinformation however because they're news sites aligned with the american right downranking them is a political statement despite the list of lies they've spread.
Theres no winning as half the people want to be lied to and it has so obviously been weaponized.
Theres no winning as half the people want to be lied to and it has so obviously been weaponized.
> actively spread disinformation however because they're news sites aligned with the american right
If you think disinformation comes from one side you have been brainwashed good
If you think disinformation comes from one side you have been brainwashed good
If you think the distribution of disinformation is uniform across both sides, you've also been brainwashed good. There is plenty of peer-reviewed research on this, but here are two that I found after brief searching:
https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/right-and-left...
https://cyber.harvard.edu/publications/2017/08/mediacloud
https://misinforeview.hks.harvard.edu/article/right-and-left...
https://cyber.harvard.edu/publications/2017/08/mediacloud
Love the strawman. I reply to your claim that its binary by saying its obviously not and you shift goalposts by talking distributions which was never the point.
kagi is just like duckduckgo
under the hood they track the shit out of you, even more than DDG with their machine learning tools for user based scoring system for links
remember everyone, duckduckgo refused every independent audits, proprietary stuff like kagi is no exception, history repeats itself
also i find it weird that product placement comments like this one are always ranked super high on this website
they are done with DDG, they shifted focus to kagi instead? suspicious, it's not even out yet, only work on macOS, and is a team of "benevolent living in San Fransisco", living on donations in the most expensive state of the US, sure :thinking_face:
under the hood they track the shit out of you, even more than DDG with their machine learning tools for user based scoring system for links
remember everyone, duckduckgo refused every independent audits, proprietary stuff like kagi is no exception, history repeats itself
also i find it weird that product placement comments like this one are always ranked super high on this website
they are done with DDG, they shifted focus to kagi instead? suspicious, it's not even out yet, only work on macOS, and is a team of "benevolent living in San Fransisco", living on donations in the most expensive state of the US, sure :thinking_face:
You got literally everything wrong about Kagi. Kagi founder here. Responding as I will not stay silent to public defamation. I'd politely ask you not to do what you did here (drop a ton of accusations without a shred of evidence) again.
> kagi is just like duckduckgo
There is almost nothing similar between Kagi and DuckDuckGo, starting with the fact that DuckDuckGo is a global brand that has ~100M users and sells ads to make money, where we have few thousand and are 100% user supported with a subscription business model.
> under the hood they track the shit out of you, even more than DDG with their machine learning tools for user based scoring system for links
We literally don't. Kagi is not only zero telemetry but we do not log or associate searches with an account. The reason is we both don't want and don't need to. Our business is selling subscriptions not user data.
> also i find it weird that product placement comments like this one are always ranked super high on this website
Perhaps people simply genuinly love the product?
> only work on macOS
I think you refer to our Orion browser, which does work on Apple devices only for now. One needs to start somewhere.
Kagi search works in any browser on any OS.
> and is a team of "benevolent living in San Fransisco", living on donations in the most expensive state of the US
I literally have no idea what you tried to imply here.
You can find my email in bio and reach out if you need any additional clarification, I am happy to provide it.
> kagi is just like duckduckgo
There is almost nothing similar between Kagi and DuckDuckGo, starting with the fact that DuckDuckGo is a global brand that has ~100M users and sells ads to make money, where we have few thousand and are 100% user supported with a subscription business model.
> under the hood they track the shit out of you, even more than DDG with their machine learning tools for user based scoring system for links
We literally don't. Kagi is not only zero telemetry but we do not log or associate searches with an account. The reason is we both don't want and don't need to. Our business is selling subscriptions not user data.
> also i find it weird that product placement comments like this one are always ranked super high on this website
Perhaps people simply genuinly love the product?
> only work on macOS
I think you refer to our Orion browser, which does work on Apple devices only for now. One needs to start somewhere.
Kagi search works in any browser on any OS.
> and is a team of "benevolent living in San Fransisco", living on donations in the most expensive state of the US
I literally have no idea what you tried to imply here.
You can find my email in bio and reach out if you need any additional clarification, I am happy to provide it.
yeah, I've kind of felt since DDG first showed up, it's weird that people just take it at face value. IMO, privacy first === open source, everything else is smoke and mirrors.
Another vote for Kagi here. What a breath of fresh air. I didn’t think they could pull it off but it seems they have.
Another vote for Kagi!
Every time I tried to switch to DDG I ended up reverting to using the !g bang on every other query. While Kagi supports the same functionality, I haven’t felt the need to use it once in the past two months that I’ve been trialing the private beta. It’s genuinely better than Google for me, which I never thought would happen.
Every time I tried to switch to DDG I ended up reverting to using the !g bang on every other query. While Kagi supports the same functionality, I haven’t felt the need to use it once in the past two months that I’ve been trialing the private beta. It’s genuinely better than Google for me, which I never thought would happen.
it's not perse about truth but it is about facts, I personally don't have a problem with downgrading lies or denies of facts. In the end of the day a algo is ranking pages, algo's can be manipulated or gamed and they are not only by lot's of marketeers but also by government agents.
While I don't believe a company should decide if an opinion about gun controle should be rankt or not. but if someone is claiming that these are just crisis actors and nothing happend I don't see a problem to block it. After all we are used to blocking spam these things are spam. I don't see a reason to treat this as any different just because they are selling political lies instate of product lies (and a lot of times these people are selling products in the end)
these kind of lies are eroding democracy and should be treaded the same way as some one yelling fire in a cinema
While I don't believe a company should decide if an opinion about gun controle should be rankt or not. but if someone is claiming that these are just crisis actors and nothing happend I don't see a problem to block it. After all we are used to blocking spam these things are spam. I don't see a reason to treat this as any different just because they are selling political lies instate of product lies (and a lot of times these people are selling products in the end)
these kind of lies are eroding democracy and should be treaded the same way as some one yelling fire in a cinema
I'm also very happy with Kagi, and i'm a french user. Very, very impressive.
sofixa(3)
Even if this is just affecting the browser and only on a few domains the brand damage here for DDG is huge.
It took DuckDuckGo years to built up their positive privacy reputation and it can all fall apart in a few days.
It took DuckDuckGo years to built up their positive privacy reputation and it can all fall apart in a few days.
DuckDuckGo showed face when they start down ranking "fake news".
Are you saying fake news doesn't exist or how should I interpet the quotes?
I'm saying it's a broad term - forget Russian news. Go ask take a Fox watcher and a CNN watcher to point out what they interpret as "Fake News" and you'll get 100s of differences.
They became the arbiter of truth. The edittor, working for the ministry of truth.
If I search for something on a search engine, I am trusting the operator of that to filter and down rank based on their own criteria, whether that's baidu, yandex, Google or DDG. It's completely reasonable for a site who's job it is to filter and aggregate results to penalise the spread of misinformation. If they don't, why am I using it at all?
It's really strange how people seem to be going out of their way to defend DDG.
They actively censor content based on political views and they now selectively enable Microsoft tracking. All in the span of like a month. And in return for all of this you still get a half-baked browsing experience.
Someone remind me what value DDG actually provides at this point? It feels like we're witnessing a self-implosion.
They actively censor content based on political views and they now selectively enable Microsoft tracking. All in the span of like a month. And in return for all of this you still get a half-baked browsing experience.
Someone remind me what value DDG actually provides at this point? It feels like we're witnessing a self-implosion.
> They actively censor content based on political views
This is news to me - could you elaborate? Does it go beyond just passively duplicating Bing's censorship due to using their search results?
This is news to me - could you elaborate? Does it go beyond just passively duplicating Bing's censorship due to using their search results?
It's basically people thinking that Russian disinformation is a political belief.
People are angry that a search engine (something dedicated to giving you relevant and true information based on what you searched for) is less likely to give you Russian state propaganda because the right wing have associated their political beliefs with that of pure free speech without realizing that such a thing just doesn't make sense in most modern settings.
People are angry that a search engine (something dedicated to giving you relevant and true information based on what you searched for) is less likely to give you Russian state propaganda because the right wing have associated their political beliefs with that of pure free speech without realizing that such a thing just doesn't make sense in most modern settings.
The political beliefs here refer to the CEO's political beliefs, given that this reaction is a consequence of the CEO's views on the conflict in Ukraine. There is a reason why DDG isn't actively censoring Chinese, American or Israeli disinformation as well, and that's because it's not in the CEO's political beliefs to do so.
But since you're trying to muddy the waters, I'm not "right wing" nor do I support the Russian invasion into Ukraine. I would have a similar reaction if CNN, Fox News or BBC were censored as well. I also wholly reject that a search engine's purpose is for "giving you [...] true information" -- I don't need that nor have I asked for it.
But since you're trying to muddy the waters, I'm not "right wing" nor do I support the Russian invasion into Ukraine. I would have a similar reaction if CNN, Fox News or BBC were censored as well. I also wholly reject that a search engine's purpose is for "giving you [...] true information" -- I don't need that nor have I asked for it.
They deliberately lower the ranking of Russian news sites.[0]
[0]:https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318
[0]:https://twitter.com/yegg/status/1501716484761997318
At least post the full quote, containing the "sites associated with Russian disinformation." bit.
Tried brave search for a while, its not great. Should I really selfhost searx? Is there any other good alternative? I've lost trust in DDG.
DDG followed by a !s (Startpage) if needed always gives me more and higher quality results than Google or any other combination of search engines I've tried. YMMV. Not sure there is any other privacy related search engine worth using. Brave feels pretty sketchy to me skimming ad dollars.
Been on brave search for a week roundabout. All of a sudden I got all these "fake-github" results I heard people speaking of, and which I never saw myself on DDG.
Try Kagi. I'm using it for months now and it's surprisingly good. It also has the !g and such bang characters, but I rarely need it.
Brave with the "mix in results from google" seems to be enough for me.
Any search engine which is on the drip of <insert big one> will ultimately fail. Search engines are not philanthropic. Bing used to behave in good manner as they couldn't attract enough paying customers so their strategy was to impair Google by attracting traffic to Bing wherever and by whatever means, even if it meant a loss for Microsoft.
Now as Google search is the entry page to Amazon, Bing sees some increase in serious traffic and MS is getting more serious about their business strategy.
We don't need a Web3, we need a decentralized spider.
Now as Google search is the entry page to Amazon, Bing sees some increase in serious traffic and MS is getting more serious about their business strategy.
We don't need a Web3, we need a decentralized spider.
I have signed up a trial of Kagi few months ago and once I got the invite I was sceptical but I thought I’ll give it a go and I never switched back since. It’s bloody awesome, results are way better than Google, never-mind DDG. Customisation is awesome too. I’m very happy with it and as soon as it comes out of beta, I’ll happily support it.
DDG needs to understand that they are in the business of "trust", which fuels their brand, and trust is gained each and every day over a long period of time, and it can be lost in an instance.
And when we deal with "trust" perception is just as relevant as reality.
This is a fork in the road for DDG, they can come out of this stronger than ever, or be tarnished and doomed.
And when we deal with "trust" perception is just as relevant as reality.
This is a fork in the road for DDG, they can come out of this stronger than ever, or be tarnished and doomed.
I moved from DDG to metager and coudn't be happier.
I had to stop using duckduckgo it use to have quality search results compared to google, now it doesn't.
Even bing is better than duckduckgo's results
Even bing is better than duckduckgo's results
DDG is Bing.
That's largely, but not entirely, true.
>traditional links in the search results, which we also source from multiple partners, though most commonly from Bing (and none from Google).
https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/so...
>traditional links in the search results, which we also source from multiple partners, though most commonly from Bing (and none from Google).
https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/so...
Why don't you side by side two tabs and search the same thing.
They are not the same, duckduckgo use to be decent. Now I can't find anything programming related.
I even removes it as my default on my work computer its that bad.
They are not the same, duckduckgo use to be decent. Now I can't find anything programming related.
I even removes it as my default on my work computer its that bad.
> Now I can't find anything programming related.
Sounds like you learned that the profile Google has on you has benefits. The more of the general population that uses DDG, the more the results will skew towards the general population who are not programmers.
Sounds like you learned that the profile Google has on you has benefits. The more of the general population that uses DDG, the more the results will skew towards the general population who are not programmers.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31490515