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Duck Duck Go: Illusion of Privacy (2013)
- runningmike 9y agoPrivacy requires full transparency. We're is documented with what foss software ddg works and where can I find trusted audit reports?
- lyk 9y agoddg's server and js are closed/proprietary, if I remember right.
- hdhzy 9y agoEven if they were completely open source how would you verify that they are using the same software on their servers? That the hardware is not compromised? Audit reports? How trustworthy are they if Symantec was able to provide good reports for such a long time for their certificate issuance when things were clearly not ok.
- fghtr 9y agoFor example if they used AGPL software, it would be much harder for them to cheat. But you can never get 100% confidence.
- pdimitar 9y agoThe only conclusion I can make from this article is to avoid services hosted in the USA but even that is not guaranteed to work -- having in mind that US agents have been known to go abroad to request access to foreign company's servers. (They were even supposedly thrown out from Iceland once -- assuming that wasn't a honey pot propaganda operation to lure people to host stuff in Iceland, of course.) What's left for the people who aren't criminals but don't like being spied on? PGP and keys that are exchanged physically, by hand? If somebody can physically spy on the infrastructure cables that your traffic goes through, will SSL protect you? As written in the article -- no it will not, because the certificate can be obtained, even if it takes some time and strong-arm effort to do so. But when a country can order you to give up private keys and keep quiet about it, really, what can you do? At this point, full decentralization, mesh networking and something times better than Tor encoded in 100% of the network code seems to be the only way out. Maybe a combination of IPFS and FreeNet, full packet-level encryption and keys that expire in 1 minute and are auto-generated for every transaction?
- stinkytaco 9y agoI've argued here at HN before that I don't think this is a technological problem, but a social one. There is nothing that stops a powerful enough actor from breaking encryption with a rubber hose, except for a strong stigma against that kind of behavior. We need to give digital privacy the same social protection. The other problem with making a purely technical solution is that you leave out people who are not capable of using that solution because they do not have the resources, education or capability.
- fiatjaf 9y agoSolving the problem with technology is 1000000 times easier than solving it from the "social" side.
- confounded 9y agoIs it? For who? Do you think people's data would be more secure at the border if - You kernal-hacked iOS so that it booted into a vanilla account upon entry of a certain passcode, and encouraged people to install your hack from GitHub, potentially borking their phones - People couldn't be compelled (or face being denied entry) to allow search of their electronic devices ? What about trying to do everything via a VPN and spoofed UA strings vs. PII being banned from sale, heavily taxed, or a meaningful opt-out existing? Or even just DNT having a legal basis?
- blfr 9y agoIs it? For who? For HN readers. And probably in general. As for your questions, I would definitely like to first use software which doesn't compromise my privacy and security and only as a very distant second have some bureaucrat who would maybe in the best case scenario fine a company which leaks my data. The vote I cast by running a Tor relay is much more meaningful and valuable defence of privacy than a vote in the general elections. By orders of magnitude.
- 9y ago
- belorn 9y agoMost of the points is arguing that NSA could compel the company Duck Duck Go, Inc to install equipment and then forbidding the company from disclosing that fact. Doing so does carry quite a bit of political risk. There have been quite a few lawsuits from EFF and ACLU in regard to do so, and as the comment from CEO of Duck Duck Go says in the comment thread, all existing cases has been about turning over records. Going the extra step of compelling people to install hardware and keeping the operation going would be a further step. I doubt ddg is currently worth the political risk. There is likely much easier targets to attack first in order to get 100% of the worlds search data. *down votes? Explanation?
- wallace_f 9y agoWith DDG's focus on privacy, I wonder why they never had any warrant canaries setup?
- pmoriarty 9y agoI'm not sure if they really need to compel DDG in the first place. I know if I was a three letter agency, I'd start a "secure" service like DDG myself as kind of a honeypot. Not that I'm saying that such an agency is actually behind DDG -- I have no way of knowing. But I would be very surprised if a large number of services promising "security" and "privacy" weren't run by such agencies or their agents. That's why I believe that frequent, independent third-party auditing (by multiple trusted groups like the EFF) would be necessary to gain any kind of confidence in such services. Even then, it'll be no guarantee that they're not compromised, but it would just make such compromise significantly more difficult and less likely to be effective.
- belorn 9y agoWhile that is always possible, I think its more plausible that they then simply buy out key companies rather than found a bunch of new companies in hope that one will succeed. The question then is, what is the likelihood that NSA is the secret owner and operator of Microsoft, Apple or Yahoo, which each would likely be the cost effective choice if one wanted access to all search queries done on the Internet. Independent third-party auditing is useful. There is the occasional fund raising for auditing of software (Truecrypt comes in mind), but I don't recall hearing one about search engines.
- kasbah 9y agoRecently I have been using the free and open source Searx more and more (admittedly mostly using the !searx shortcut from DDG). Results seem better than DDG sometimes. Would be interesting to try and host my own instance or write something that picks a random public instance. https://asciimoo.github.io/searx/ https://asciimoo.github.io/searx/
- hdhzy 9y agoWow, very cool project! Thanks for sharing.
- chiefalchemist 9y agoi saw there's an Installation page but do you know of an easy step by step tutorial for setting this up? Perhaps with a low cost recommended host, etc.?
- OJFord 9y agoThere's a Dockerfile, just spin that up. (Or, if needed, find a brief step-by-step on running a docker container, because that's all there is to getting searx running.)
- KGIII 9y agoAlong that same line is YaCy. https://yacy.net/en/index.html https://yacy.net/en/index.html
- kasbah 9y agoI think YaCy didn't give me very good results last I tried it. It's not a fair comparison, as it has been a few years for sure, but if I had to guess then I would say that Searx, being just a search engine aggregator (it doesn't do crawling), gives better results.
- KGIII 9y agoI tried it last about six months ago. It was a marked improvement over what it was a couple of years prior. I like that it is decentralized and stores no private data. To me, the decentralized part is important. But, I'm not sure I'd say it's ready for prime time. With Searx, you still need the regular search engines. I suspect that your traffic can still be identified, say through timing requests or from piecing together behavioral data. I haven't really dug that deep to investigate the risks. I will give it a shot tomorrow, just to try it out. I've seen it in passing but you're the first person I've seen, in the wild, that uses it. I'll give it a test run.
- sfRattan 9y agoI think DuckDuckGo is unfairly singled out here. They do more than most companies to protect privacy, and most of their users are specifically trying to deprive Google of more feed for its data silo. Of course they can't protect you from the NSA. Extremely few actors can. If your threat model includes actors within the US Federal Government (especially the intelligence community), run. Yesterday. That's a statement about our times, not about any particular company. The solution ought to be browbeating the US Government for unethical practices, not browbeating a company that does privacy better than most, and not as well as would be necessary to stand toe-to-toe with some of the most powerful and far reaching organizations in the world.
- sandworm101 9y agoProtection from the Nation State Actors cannot come from companies. One must implement protections on one's own client-side. Proper encryption always. Tor when needed. Software and, where possible, hardware only from trusted sources.
- TAForObvReasons 9y agoThe article was a response to a guardian article that ultimately cited https://siliconangle.com/blog/2013/06/14/duckduckgo-the-prism-proof-search-engine-that-the-nsa-just-cant-track/ https://siliconangle.com/blog/2013/06/14/duckduckgo-the-pris... > “By not storing any useful information, DuckDuckGo simply isn’t useful to these surveillance programs,” says Weinberg. “We literally do not store personally identifiable user data, so if the NSA were to get a hold of all our data, it would not be useful to them since it is all truly anonymous.” DDG is "unfairly singled out" for good reason, namely that company representatives made an incorrect assertion. DDG is still useful for ongoing surveillance, as the article pondered: > But what if DuckDuckGo provided a splitter-feed to the NSA? DuckDuckGo can claim without lying that they store no personal information, but that speaks nothing of a collaborating partner storing it.
- fghtr 9y agoI am participating in a peer-to-peer search engine based on free software, http://yacy.net http://yacy.net. But I am not sure it can save us from NSA... We have to take political steps against them anyway.
- bitmapbrother 9y agoSo does DDG produce a transparency report and if not then why not?
- jerheinze 9y agoIf you're worried that DDG may log your IP you can simply use it with the Tor Browser (it's the default search engine) or use their onion service (https://3g2upl4pq6kufc4m.onion/ https://3g2upl4pq6kufc4m.onion/) for increased security and anonymity.
- jacquesm 9y agoTor is far from perfect and there are several ways in which one could connect traffic at some endpoint with a user at a specific IP. Do not rely on Tor if you really want anonymity.
- wolco 9y agoTor offers a layer of protection. It is possible to stay anon on Tor.
- jacquesm 9y ago> It is possible to stay anon on Tor. That is an extremely dangerous statement to make and one I do not agree with. Keep in mind that: - you will have to trust that a large chunk of the nodes is not in the hands of someone that you count as your enemy - that even if your enemy is not in charge of a substantial part of the network they may still be monitoring entry and egress and that that alone can be enough to figure out who is talking to who - that any data present at egress that can be intercepted might still reveal who you are So no, Tor is not 100% secure and it is very well possible that even if you use Tor your identity will be connected with some activity or even all of your activity while using the network.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Sidious 9y agoCollecting meta-data is not benign at all, it's trivial for the usual suspects to de-anonymise, and profile based on browsing habits. Fat protocols should marshal the true web 2.0 along with DAOs.
- indefenseofddg1 9y agoThe issues brought up in this post apply to every single service operating online, and it only applies to DuckDuckGo in any special way because of their increasing size. This includes "client" encrypted webmail and similar applications: they can be forced to deliver malicious JS that gives up your keys, or the JS client delivery can be MitM'ed. Many people seeking enhanced privacy from DuckDuckGo are seeking privacy from Google, not from state actors. For that, you'd need additional measures like Tor, for which DuckDuckGo provides a convenient .onion service. Even if DDG is secretly tracking all our searches, they have less data to correlate it with. My current privacy complaint on DuckDuckGo, combined with browser search UI issues (looking at you, Chrome) is over the !bangs. If you're doing "!w [sensitive topic]" instead of tabbing to Wikipedia search in your browser and searching that way, you're risking DDG or anyone who's compromised DDG seeing your Wikipedia searches, when the search should go straight to Wikipedia, Twitter, Stack Overflow, and so on.
- feelin_googley 9y agoLike Google, by default DDG tracks what results the user clicks on. URLs are prefixed with a DDG URL. Users HTTP requests are forwarded through DDG servers. By default, DDG "lite" does not set cookies or use Javascript. However, if the user wants to change the default "settings" (HTTP has no state so this is a fiction), then AFAICT she has to enable Javascript and accept cookies. Privacy conscious users do not want Javascript or cookies. DDG could achieve the same result by simply providing an alternate URL, something like /lite2 in addition to /lite. Whether DDG saves this data I have no idea. But one has to wonder why, if privacy is a goal, DDG is collecting it to begin with. If DDG believes it is doing this for the benefit of users, it is not convincing because there are alternative ways to achieve the same benefit that do not require prefixing URLs, Javascript or use of cookies. For example, browser settings already allow the user to control HTTP Referer headers, assuming queries were submitted using GET. The user can change the settings in the browser so that no referer is sent, or to send a custom referer of her choosing. Another example is if DDG accepted queries via POST method in addition to GET. No search terms would be leaked in the URL or in any HTTP referer.
- kuhsaft 9y agoAccording to DDG, they prefix the links to prevent the destination websites from obtaining the search terms used via the HTTP Referer header. Source: https://duckduckgo.com/privacy https://duckduckgo.com/privacy
- tagawa 9y agoDuckDuckGo staff here - just want to clarify a couple of points: * We don't track result clicks. URLs are no longer prefixed with a DDG URL by default except for old browsers (although this is controllable in the settings: https://duckduckgo.com/settings#privacy https://duckduckgo.com/settings#privacy ), but even if this is in effect we don't store which sites users visit. We started stripping search queries in referrer headers in 2010 and you're right, current web standards make it possible to do this without us having to redirect through our own servers. * We have an alternative non-JavaScript URL - https://duckduckgo.com/html https://duckduckgo.com/html - which tries to offer a fuller search experience than the minimalist https://duckduckgo.com/lite https://duckduckgo.com/lite * Cookies are used to store settings but if users prefer to block them, preferences can still be "saved" by using URL parameters, listed here: https://duckduckgo.com/params https://duckduckgo.com/params These can be used either to form a local bookmark/start page or anonymously in the cloud with a password only (no username or other data). > But one has to wonder why, if privacy is a goal, DDG is collecting it to begin with. I'm not sure which data this is referring to but we don't collect or share personal information. There's more on this in our privacy policy: https://duckduckgo.com/privacy https://duckduckgo.com/privacy
- known 9y agoI wrote my own search engine and using it. Not very difficult.
- bad_user 9y agoDuck Duck Go is a company that I want to succeed, as they are clearly making a stand on user privacy. However it never made sense to me why people would use those DDG bangs. I mean privacy is the main selling point, so why in the world would you send the searches you make on other websites to DDG, when the browser is perfectly capable of being configured for "search keywords". In Firefox, go to amazon.com (or any website you want), right click on their search bar and select "Add a Keyword for this search...". Add "!a" or whatever you want. There, you've got your own bangs.
- dredmorbius 9y agoNot all browsers are configurable to search keywords (particularly on mobile). DDG is consistent across hosts / browsers / OSes. DDG maintain (and fix) the bang searches as they break (which ... happens). I appreciate being able to !bang away in my Android browser(s) navbars. There are other options. Surfraw (a Linux CLI utility) is an example, though my problem is that 1) I can't remember the aliases and 2) they interfere with other commands I use (there are ... a lot of surfraw elvi).
- patkai 9y agoI use Duckduckgo because I don't like monocultures.
- whipoodle 9y agoVery noble.
- cyphunk 9y agocomparison of using DDG vs Google over tor is enlightening (GIF): https://twitter.com/cyphunk/status/849615910545620992 https://twitter.com/cyphunk/status/849615910545620992
- dredmorbius 9y agoGoogle's anti-bot measures DoS the service for me rather frequently. (Perhaps I am a robot?)
- apatters 9y agoMy beef with this article is that it's unreasonably reductionist to conclude that DDG provides an "illusion" of privacy based on the fact that they're as vulnerable to being targeted by the NSA as anyone else. The issue of privacy is so much bigger than that. If you use Google Search and someone obtains access to the data they have on you, legally or illegally, they could end up obtaining many years of your browsing history. If you use DDG they have nothing, and the most they can do (as the article states) is start collecting your search habits from that point onward. I don't want huge companies to amass giant archives of data about me. There are so many ways it can be abused by a multitude of actors. It's a selling point to me when a service retains little or no information, and if it needs to retain something, it requests limited permission in clear and simple terms.
- _qbxp 9y agoThis is something that's always been fascinating to me. In any thread about privacy, there's always a comment along the lines of "if your threat model is a nation-state, then you're screwed." You hear it about DDG, Tor, client-side but web-delivered encrypted email, etc. What if your threat model is a nation state? What's the proper way to ensure your privacy that does not require abstaining from the internet? Is a high degree of privacy even possible?
- jokoon 9y agoPrivacy from the state never really existed, even before the internet. Paperwork always allowed the state to know things. Information has always been power, and information is an important tool for governments so they can be able to work. I think it always has been. I'm more worried about privacy from private interests. The issue is what the governments do with data, and if the government let private parties access it, and where do you draw the line between the government having right to access, and companies being allowed to access it, because you will often have situations where things are not clear. To be honest I will always have a problem with the whole privacy/surveillance debate, because there are things the government should know, but only because it is the government. Private companies are now being able to track people and have the same kind of data the government has. So there is a big nuance, and it is often shut out by the outrage, which frankly comes from a libertarian agenda, which I have a problem with.
- mighty_bander 9y agoRecently I had a series of unfortunate plumbing mishaps at my home that set me back a bunch of money. I did very minimal google searching (just confirming the spelling of the plumber's name), but ads offering emergency home loans have started popping up in my browser. If I can go to a search engine that doesn't sell the fact of possible financial problems to whatever loan shark is willing to pay the most to get to me, I see that as a win.
- ambar123 9y agoOHhh .Its look some one has been paid hefty amount by google... monster..
- alsadi 9y agoTo be fair here is ceo response quote Hi, this is Gabriel Weinberg, CEO and founder of DuckDuckGo. I do not believe we can be compelled to store or siphon off user data to the NSA or anyone else. All the existing US laws are about turning over existing business records and not about compelling you change your business practices. In our case such an order would further force us to lie to consumers, which would put us in trouble with the FTC and irreparably hurt our business. We have not received any request like this, and do not expect to. We have spoken with many lawyers particularly skilled and experienced in this part of US and international law. If we were to receive such a request we believe as do these others it would be highly unconstitutional on many independent grounds, and there is plenty of legal precedent there. With CALEA in particular, search engines are exempt. There are many additional legal and technical inaccuracies in this article and I will not address all of them in this comment. All our front-end servers are hosted on Amazon not Verizon, for example.
- asmdev 9y agoHere is the link to the CEO's response for those interested: http://etherrag.blogspot.in/2013/07/duck-duck-go-illusion-of-privacy.html?showComment=1373764601583#c337630469341123253 http://etherrag.blogspot.in/2013/07/duck-duck-go-illusion-of...
- justin66 9y agoThe amount of unearned confidence the author of the blog displays in his reply is kind of embarrassing. "I read a CNET article once that contradicts what you're saying!" He created that blog account just to write that article and it's the only one up there. Stuff like this makes me wonder what motivates some people.