4 ms·

The sole benefit of DDG is their claim that they don't track. One problem with this narrow focus is that many people mistakenly carry this statement over to an

The sole benefit of DDG is their claim that they don't track. One problem with this narrow focus is that many people mistakenly carry this statement over to an assumption that DDG doesn't censor their search results. I suspect that DDG both knows and counts on this as an aspect of an undeserved reputation. DDG's search results aren't acceptable for anything even mildly controversial. I'll use them for image searches, but there are better search engines for internet access and that give equivalent or better privacy. Also in my opinion, DDG's penchant for censorship harms the credibility of their assertion that they do not track.

rlpb 3y ago
A huge benefit of DDG for me is that I can use it in a private browser window and it just works without stupid popups getting in the way. In contrast Google is far less useable for a quick search. This alone is why I have DDG as default and I only drop back to Google when I'm struggling to find what I want. Most of the time DDG is fine for me.
- bitL 3y ago
  Recently so many unrelated sites pop up a tiny Google login window somewhere on the page, obstructing what I want to see, like as if Google was super desperate for more tracking and engagement. Like why would I like to login to Google while viewing a forum about skyscrapers if I just wanted to read about the progress of some construction? Passive-aggressive at its core.
  - yegg 3y ago
    Note that we added support to remove those Google login pop-ups on third-party sites within our apps/extensions. See https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/web-tracking-protections/#google-sign-in-pop-up-protection https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/we... for details and https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/web-tracking-protections/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/we... for the full list of other protections.
  - alx__ 3y ago
    That's the sites itself enabling that, most likely their auth provider has SSO with groogle https://developers.google.com/identity/gsi/web/guides/offerings https://developers.google.com/identity/gsi/web/guides/offeri... Also, you can kinda-disable this per browser https://myaccount.google.com/security https://myaccount.google.com/security -> "Signing in to other sites"
  - aembleton 3y ago
    Add the following line to your uBlock Origin filters to block these: accounts.google.com$domain=~google.*|~youtube.com|~gmail.com
kevin_thibedeau 3y ago
> DDG's penchant for censorship harms the credibility of their assertion that they do not track. DDG is limited to Bing now that Yandex was cancelled. All the censorship comes from Microsoft not DDG.
ssalka 3y ago
Another benefit is that it keeps getting increasingly better compared to Google – not because DDG is doing anything particularly innovative, but because Google search keeps getting worse and worse.
yegg 3y ago
(I'm the CEO & Founder of DuckDuckGo.) It is simply not true that we have censored anything or made ourselves "the arbiters of truth." I realized I previously explained how our news rankings work very poorly on Twitter but I subsequently put out a clarification in this help page with a much clearer (and detailed) explanation of how our news rankings actually work: https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/news-rankings/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/ne... From that page: "When we apply our own ranking signals we do so in a strictly non-political manner, meaning we don’t evaluate or otherwise take into account any potential political bias or leanings of websites in our search result rankings."
- metafatess 3y ago
  > It is simply not true that we have censored anything or made ourselves "the arbiters of truth." > When we apply our own ranking signals we do so in a strictly non-political manner, meaning we don’t evaluate or otherwise take into account any potential political bias or leanings of websites in our search result rankings. Yeah? What about that? https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/tb6cj8/duckduckgo_started_censoring_websites_accused_of/ https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/tb6cj8/duckd...
praisewhitey 3y ago
The reason I started using DDG a decade ago is because they "censor" their search results https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2181585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2181585
aio2 3y ago
what are some ther services that are less restricting? i use searx

rlpb 3y ago

A huge benefit of DDG for me is that I can use it in a private browser window and it just works without stupid popups getting in the way. In contrast Google is far less useable for a quick search. This alone is why I have DDG as default and I only drop back to Google when I'm struggling to find what I want. Most of the time DDG is fine for me.

bitL 3y ago
Recently so many unrelated sites pop up a tiny Google login window somewhere on the page, obstructing what I want to see, like as if Google was super desperate for more tracking and engagement. Like why would I like to login to Google while viewing a forum about skyscrapers if I just wanted to read about the progress of some construction? Passive-aggressive at its core.
- yegg 3y ago
  Note that we added support to remove those Google login pop-ups on third-party sites within our apps/extensions. See https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/web-tracking-protections/#google-sign-in-pop-up-protection https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/we... for details and https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/web-tracking-protections/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/privacy/we... for the full list of other protections.
- alx__ 3y ago
  That's the sites itself enabling that, most likely their auth provider has SSO with groogle https://developers.google.com/identity/gsi/web/guides/offerings https://developers.google.com/identity/gsi/web/guides/offeri... Also, you can kinda-disable this per browser https://myaccount.google.com/security https://myaccount.google.com/security -> "Signing in to other sites"
- aembleton 3y ago
  Add the following line to your uBlock Origin filters to block these: accounts.google.com$domain=~google.*|~youtube.com|~gmail.com

kevin_thibedeau 3y ago

> DDG's penchant for censorship harms the credibility of their assertion that they do not track. DDG is limited to Bing now that Yandex was cancelled. All the censorship comes from Microsoft not DDG.

ssalka 3y ago

Another benefit is that it keeps getting increasingly better compared to Google – not because DDG is doing anything particularly innovative, but because Google search keeps getting worse and worse.

yegg 3y ago

(I'm the CEO & Founder of DuckDuckGo.) It is simply not true that we have censored anything or made ourselves "the arbiters of truth." I realized I previously explained how our news rankings work very poorly on Twitter but I subsequently put out a clarification in this help page with a much clearer (and detailed) explanation of how our news rankings actually work: https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/news-rankings/ https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/ne... From that page: "When we apply our own ranking signals we do so in a strictly non-political manner, meaning we don’t evaluate or otherwise take into account any potential political bias or leanings of websites in our search result rankings."

metafatess 3y ago
> It is simply not true that we have censored anything or made ourselves "the arbiters of truth." > When we apply our own ranking signals we do so in a strictly non-political manner, meaning we don’t evaluate or otherwise take into account any potential political bias or leanings of websites in our search result rankings. Yeah? What about that? https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/tb6cj8/duckduckgo_started_censoring_websites_accused_of/ https://www.reddit.com/r/PrivacyGuides/comments/tb6cj8/duckd...

praisewhitey 3y ago

The reason I started using DDG a decade ago is because they "censor" their search results https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2181585 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2181585

aio2 3y ago

what are some ther services that are less restricting? i use searx