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Why You Should Be Using a Private Search Engine
- anigbrowl 9y agoThis seems like a press release. What's the difference from something like DuckDuckGo other than branding?
- jdc0589 9y agoduckduckgo is pretty great too. I use it probably 75% of the time
- skrowl 9y agoCame here to see if anyone had a reason to use it over DDG. DDG is pretty great and you can always add !g to your query to jump to Google if you really need to (and don't mind the data being shared with any government that asks, of course).
- NotCamelCase 9y agoI've switched to DuckDuckGo a while ago but didn't know this feature, thanks! I for some reason had expected a lower quality but it's pretty effective as a search engine so I'm content.
- scaryclam 9y agoIf you're interested, there's a whole load of them: https://duckduckgo.com/bang https://duckduckgo.com/bang
- wafflesraccoon 9y agoBy far my favorite little feature, it speeds up my workflow a ton.
- nerdponx 9y agoThere's also searx, which is self-hostable.
- djrogers 9y agoPretty sure the concepts of self-hosting and indexing the modern internet are kinda mutually exclusive...
- uncletaco 9y agohow does it compare with bing for porn?
- searchencrypt 9y agoIf you want to search "privately", Search Encrypt will allow you to do so. Bing, however, tracks users and links their searches to Microsoft accounts. We also have expiring browser history so anyone with access to your computer will not be able to see what you searched for. We explained how this works in this post: https://blog.searchencrypt.com/tech/remove-search-encrypt-extension/ https://blog.searchencrypt.com/tech/remove-search-encrypt-ex...
- 9y ago
- tmikaeld 9y agoThey seem to do the following according to their FAQ[1]: - "We utilize the latest encryption technologies, including a feature known as Perfect Forward Secrecy which goes a step further than traditional SSL by using a unique public key for each individual session" - "Even server logs are disabled to ensure that any identifiable information your browser may be broadcasting" with requests are never read or stored on our servers. - "On top of all that we utilize an extra layer of query encryption at the client side in order to ensure that your history remains private from other users who may access your computer" [1]: https://www.searchencrypt.com/about/faq https://www.searchencrypt.com/about/faq
- searchencrypt 9y agohttps://blog.searchencrypt.com/tech/search-encrypt-work/ https://blog.searchencrypt.com/tech/search-encrypt-work/ This is more info on how we encrypt your searches.
- greglindahl 9y agoThe first 2 features are pretty common in privacy-focused search engines. The 3rd involves a closed-source browser extension doing who-knows-what... and who's it been audited by?
- CobrastanJorji 9y agoWhat makes you think that a site whose Alexa Ranking has jumped up from 2,993 to 1,814 in the last three months alone would need to issue press releases disguised as informative blog posts? This is a regular blog post about the 5 WAYS SEARCH ENCRYPT PROTECTS YOU.
- freedomben 9y agoNot OP, but maximizing continued growth on an upward trend are what makes me think "that a site whose Alexa Ranking has jumped up from 2,993 to 1,814 in the last three months alone would need to issue press releases disguised as informative blog posts." Any marketer worth their salt would do this too. If you don't, you're wasting a golden opportunity.
- morinted 9y agoThe commenter you replied to was being very sarcastic.
- jccalhoun 9y agoI couldn't find where they get their results. I searched for my real name which has a hyphen and it didn't find anything for me when google, bing, and duckduckgo do. Instead if found a bunch for a baseball player whose name is part of mine, and a couple of low quality links for things like "______ arrest records" and other junk. I don't think I will switch.
- jgillich 9y agoFor any search term I enter, the first 5 results are ads and only one actual result fits on my screen. What the actual fuck.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- ChuckMcM 9y agoI don't disagree with the premise, but given that nobody can afford to make the actual 'engine' part of a search engine other than Microsoft, Google, Yandex, and Baidu you're pretty much stuck with having your queries ending up at one of the four anyway. Masking front ends are ok but not any more effective than say using Tor to route your search requests. Today this suggestion, you should use a private search engine, is equivalent in my mind to you should only use cash to buy things. When you have a panoptic view of both, digital and commercial activity the ability to create a reconstruction of what you have been doing or thinking through meta-data analysis becomes quite difficult to avoid. At this point having your browser spam with other searches as a fuzzing technique would be effective. I suggested (only half joking) that a fundable startup might be a system where subscribers send in their license plate and for $10/month or something every month they will get an envelope with one, two, or three other license plate symbols printed on magnetic material to stick to your car. It doesn't have to look like a license plate to you and me, only to an automated license plate reader which leaves a lot of room for avoiding state laws about having multiple plates. The idea being that members plates will be thoroughly mixed with a bunch of false hits in license plate reader data bases everywhere making use of that data impractical for your enemies.
- greglindahl 9y agoOnly paying cash for privacy reasons is a good metaphor: not only is it kind of a pain to carry cash & not run out, but some stores have stopped taking cash. For example, my favorite coffee shop on University Ave in Palo Alto :-( BTW the license plate thing has been done by my friends with store loyalty cards, but after a while everyone got bored doing it.
- hux_ 9y agoOffline search is the obvious alternative. Every cell in your body has its own data and search engine. It doesn't need a Google, Microsoft, Yandex, and Baidu. How come? Downloading a dump of Wikipedia or Stackoverflow and indexing it however you like on mid range hardware is trivial today. Look at what Kiwix or Zeal(offline doc browser) do today. It's just a matter of time before people start packaging up data and indexes customized to your info needs downloadable like a song from iTunes.
- boomboomsubban 9y agoThis is spam, probably for malware. They give no reason to trust them, their site is a series of blogposts that only contain inane promises, and they're owned by a company who developed "Adverify," which seems to be some service to see how well your ads are getting past blockers.
- morinted 9y agoThe post is titled "why you should be using a private search engine" and yet there's only a paragraph at the end that's subtitled: Why You Should Use Private Search Engines? Here's the entirety of that section: The truth is, people know that search engines are tracking them. Most websites have privacy policies which clearly state that they use cookies and other means of tracking users. Any in many cases, when we are asked to give apps, websites, or products permission to track us, we blindly agree. This may seem acceptable at first, but it’s problematic if that same tracker is following you two years later, when you’ve forgotten about it. Your search engine should be optimized for searching the internet, not tracking you once you’ve left. Your Google information can be used against you in legal cases, even in civil cases like divorces. So if I understand correctly: 1. You might forget about trackers you've accepted. 2. Your search history can be used against you in the court of law. They couldn't come up with anything better for this ad?
- LV-426 9y agoPretty funny how anti-tracking they are, in their daily submissions to HN, considering the number of resources from external sites - Google, Facebook, Medium, Twitter, Linkedin, etc - their page loads.
- wafflesraccoon 9y agoI really love DuckDuckGo too, while I find my search results can be off sometimes (Ie, searching for React gives YouTube reaction videos before the JS library) their bang search feature rocks.
- shafyy 9y agoWhy the shit is this even being discussed on HN? This is clearly self-promotion and should be banned.