5 ms·

Doesn't DuckDuckGo use Bing's results behind the scenes? At any rate right now I see no obvious censorship: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=tank+man&iax=image

by simias 5y ago

Doesn't DuckDuckGo use Bing's results behind the scenes? At any rate right now I see no obvious censorship: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=tank+man&iax=images&ia=images https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=tank+man&iax=images&ia=imag...

adventured 5y ago
That's because Microsoft got caught censoring the results, then they lied and claimed it was a "human error," which absolutely nobody believes. Then Microsoft manually took an action to restore the image results in Bing for the query "tank man." Which then filtered down to DDG since it relies on Bing (previously DDG's image results were similarly devoid of the proper results).
- bigwavedave 5y ago
  > That's because Microsoft got caught censoring the results, then they lied and claimed it was a "human error," which absolutely nobody believes. Oh, I don't know. If we can label "accidentally using the wrong scope" as a human error, I could easily see a situation where someone meant to remove something from Chinese search results but accidentally did it worldwide. I don't know what their infrastructure is like, what kind of safeguards they have in place, or even what they do to block a result from the all-seeing algorithm. Which is more likely: that Microsoft would allow China to dictate what the rest of the world can/cannot see or that someone made a mistake and blocked something globally instead of regionally?
  - relativ575 5y ago
    I find it baffled that a company of that caliber don't have regression tests that can verify region-bound changes wouldn't affect results intended for other regions.
    - kbenson 5y ago
      If someone accidentally didn't scope the change as region bound, what makes you think they couldn't accidentally scope the test wrong the same way? Human error knows no bounds.
    - true_religion 5y ago
      It was a mistake not an accident. When you make an accident, test safety checks can save you. However although you don’t intentionally make a mistake, you do intentionally carry it out. In that case, no amount of safety checking will stop a human being from implementing bad logic.
- Arnavion 5y ago
  >Then Microsoft manually took an action to restore the image results in Bing for the query "tank man." Did they? https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man has no results of Tank Man. https://imgur.com/a/U5fDs7P https://imgur.com/a/U5fDs7P (If you do see Tank Man images, see the edit at the end of this comment.) If you press enter on the search box with the pre-filled "tank man", then you get a URL with more query-string parameters - https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&imgurl=&cbir=sbi&imageBin=&qs=ds&form=QBILPG https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&imgurl=&cbir=s... , and that page does contain the actual Tank Man. Seems it can be narrowed down to the form= parameter. https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&form=QBILPG https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&form=QBILPG has Tank Man, without the form= it doesn't. The actual value of the form= parameter doesn't value either, as long as it's not empty. I have no idea what they're doing in the backend. Edit: Another weird thing - https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man with JS enabled redirects to a different page with additional querystring parameters, and this page does have Tank Man. My testing above was done with JS disabled, which is why I got the pre-redirect page that doesn't have his pictures.
  - lamontcg 5y ago
    they probably need the query string for pagination and if you don't have it they redirect you with some javascript which you turning it off breaks. i don't think there's any grand conspiracy there.
    - Arnavion 5y ago
      Yes, I didn't claim they were doing it intentionally, just that the website's behavior is weird. That's why I said: >I have no idea what they're doing in the backend. The pagination theory doesn't make sense to me though. The relevant parameter is called "form", its actual value doesn't matter as long as it's non-empty, and surely a sane implementation would treat the lack of a page parameter as page 1 and not page whatever-the-stormtrooper-image-is-on.
mdoms 5y ago
As long as DDG uses Bing's results then they also implement Bing's censorship policies. That's a choice DDG makes.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  Less a choice, more a consequence. It’s not like DDG wants to replicate MS’s search policies, it’s just that DDG lacks the infrastructure to do it on their own. Until they do, this is going to keep happening.
- gentleman11 5y ago
  I don’t think ddg was consulted or informed here. Choice is a strong phrasing
fomine3 5y ago
I don't blame DDG, but I argue that fallback into Google (self operated search engine, and not operated in China) somewhat makes sense for this.

by simias 5y ago

adventured 5y ago

That's because Microsoft got caught censoring the results, then they lied and claimed it was a "human error," which absolutely nobody believes. Then Microsoft manually took an action to restore the image results in Bing for the query "tank man." Which then filtered down to DDG since it relies on Bing (previously DDG's image results were similarly devoid of the proper results).

bigwavedave 5y ago
> That's because Microsoft got caught censoring the results, then they lied and claimed it was a "human error," which absolutely nobody believes. Oh, I don't know. If we can label "accidentally using the wrong scope" as a human error, I could easily see a situation where someone meant to remove something from Chinese search results but accidentally did it worldwide. I don't know what their infrastructure is like, what kind of safeguards they have in place, or even what they do to block a result from the all-seeing algorithm. Which is more likely: that Microsoft would allow China to dictate what the rest of the world can/cannot see or that someone made a mistake and blocked something globally instead of regionally?
- relativ575 5y ago
  I find it baffled that a company of that caliber don't have regression tests that can verify region-bound changes wouldn't affect results intended for other regions.
  - kbenson 5y ago
    If someone accidentally didn't scope the change as region bound, what makes you think they couldn't accidentally scope the test wrong the same way? Human error knows no bounds.
  - true_religion 5y ago
    It was a mistake not an accident. When you make an accident, test safety checks can save you. However although you don’t intentionally make a mistake, you do intentionally carry it out. In that case, no amount of safety checking will stop a human being from implementing bad logic.
Arnavion 5y ago
>Then Microsoft manually took an action to restore the image results in Bing for the query "tank man." Did they? https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man has no results of Tank Man. https://imgur.com/a/U5fDs7P https://imgur.com/a/U5fDs7P (If you do see Tank Man images, see the edit at the end of this comment.) If you press enter on the search box with the pre-filled "tank man", then you get a URL with more query-string parameters - https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&imgurl=&cbir=sbi&imageBin=&qs=ds&form=QBILPG https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&imgurl=&cbir=s... , and that page does contain the actual Tank Man. Seems it can be narrowed down to the form= parameter. https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&form=QBILPG https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man&form=QBILPG has Tank Man, without the form= it doesn't. The actual value of the form= parameter doesn't value either, as long as it's not empty. I have no idea what they're doing in the backend. Edit: Another weird thing - https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=tank+man with JS enabled redirects to a different page with additional querystring parameters, and this page does have Tank Man. My testing above was done with JS disabled, which is why I got the pre-redirect page that doesn't have his pictures.
- lamontcg 5y ago
  they probably need the query string for pagination and if you don't have it they redirect you with some javascript which you turning it off breaks. i don't think there's any grand conspiracy there.
  - Arnavion 5y ago
    Yes, I didn't claim they were doing it intentionally, just that the website's behavior is weird. That's why I said: >I have no idea what they're doing in the backend. The pagination theory doesn't make sense to me though. The relevant parameter is called "form", its actual value doesn't matter as long as it's non-empty, and surely a sane implementation would treat the lack of a page parameter as page 1 and not page whatever-the-stormtrooper-image-is-on.

mdoms 5y ago

As long as DDG uses Bing's results then they also implement Bing's censorship policies. That's a choice DDG makes.

ashtonkem 5y ago
Less a choice, more a consequence. It’s not like DDG wants to replicate MS’s search policies, it’s just that DDG lacks the infrastructure to do it on their own. Until they do, this is going to keep happening.
gentleman11 5y ago
I don’t think ddg was consulted or informed here. Choice is a strong phrasing

fomine3 5y ago

I don't blame DDG, but I argue that fallback into Google (self operated search engine, and not operated in China) somewhat makes sense for this.