3 ms·

I'm guessing that's because they want to remove the referrer header from the request to the site (such that the site wouldn't be able to see what you were searc

I'm guessing that's because they want to remove the referrer header from the request to the site (such that the site wouldn't be able to see what you were searching for). The reason it's not on the JS version (and I'm guessing again) is that if you have JS enabled, you're probably using an up to date browser which supports the referrer meta tag (where you can specify how the referrer header should be stripped).

ThePhysicist 5y ago
Yes that seems to be correct, it's explained here: https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/rduckduckgocom/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/rd... You can turn this off in your settings if you like, but it's actually there to protect your privacy.
- marginalia_nu 5y ago
  Seems like pretty sketchy privacy algebra, the number of browsers that don't respect Referrer-Policy: no-referrer is very small, and at the same time this allows them to gather statistics on which links are clicked, the latter is a far bigger privacy concern.
  - yegg 5y ago
    This is not on in modern browsers. From the referenced help page (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31170796 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31170796): ** On modern browsers we accomplish this by adding a small piece of code to our page called Meta referrer. Some browsers (especially older ones) do not support this standard, however. For those browsers, and also in situations where meta referrer doesn't work, we send the request back to our servers to remove search terms. This redirect goes through r.duckduckgo.com. You can disable this privacy feature. To do that, go to the settings page, select Privacy, and change the option Redirect to Off. **
    - marginalia_nu 5y ago
      Ah, my bad, I misunderstood then. That is perfectly reasonable.

3 ms·

I'm guessing that's because they want to remove the referrer header from the request to the site (such that the site wouldn't be able to see what you were searc

by frankjr 5y ago

ThePhysicist 5y ago
Yes that seems to be correct, it's explained here: https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/rduckduckgocom/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/rd... You can turn this off in your settings if you like, but it's actually there to protect your privacy.
- marginalia_nu 5y ago
  Seems like pretty sketchy privacy algebra, the number of browsers that don't respect Referrer-Policy: no-referrer is very small, and at the same time this allows them to gather statistics on which links are clicked, the latter is a far bigger privacy concern.
  - yegg 5y ago
    This is not on in modern browsers. From the referenced help page (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31170796 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31170796): ** On modern browsers we accomplish this by adding a small piece of code to our page called Meta referrer. Some browsers (especially older ones) do not support this standard, however. For those browsers, and also in situations where meta referrer doesn't work, we send the request back to our servers to remove search terms. This redirect goes through r.duckduckgo.com. You can disable this privacy feature. To do that, go to the settings page, select Privacy, and change the option Redirect to Off. **
    - marginalia_nu 5y ago
      Ah, my bad, I misunderstood then. That is perfectly reasonable.