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I wonder how they are ensuring that the searches I do are completely anonymized. I understand that that they do not store IP address/cookie/etc, but often by j
by akshat 16y ago
I wonder how they are ensuring that the searches I do are completely anonymized.
I understand that that they do not store IP address/cookie/etc, but often by just looking at as little as a few searches you can zero down on the person in question. For example I have often searched for:
Citrix
Blogvault
I am possibly the only person who will be searching for both those things.
- mtigas 16y agoIf only the search itself is stored, without any separate and possibly-identifying information (IP, sesssion, time), then it doesn’t matter if you are the only one that searches for these things. By their account, if you search something (A) and then you search something else (B), there is no way to link A and B. They are two separate searches and they could have been performed by separate users. Granted, given a ton of disparate searches, you could theoretically group searches by possible users — or at the very least, by similar users — by statistical means. (Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, while they mention timestamps in terms of other search engines, they do not mention their own policy regarding them. Timestamps are not directly “identifying information” but they still significantly boost the likelihood that a specific user is performing a given set of searches.)
- akshat 16y agoActually now thinking about it, hopefully if they are not storing IP(or cookie etc)at any point of time, even temporarily, two searches will not show relationship with each other. But I can imagine the benefits of keeping track of all searches done by one user. It can definitely be used to improve the search engine itself.
- Legion 16y agoI have now done the same search query. Get a bunch of other people on board, and you'll have crowdsourced your privacy. :)