I was using DuckDuckGo for some time, but heard that there are better alternatives. I’m confused, because DDG is used by default in TOR browser, and other privacy respecting browsers (ex. Librewolf). Can you guys recommend any other search engine, and tell me why u recommend it?
Or, is DDG enough?
I’ve heard of Startpage (which appears to be a frontend for Google results), but I personally like Brave Search more (visually, also you have !bangs for quickly searching wikipedia, ddg or startpage when you need it). I heard ecosia should be private, buy I’ve been ciritical and didn’t look into it yet, because its main focus appears to be planting trees.
I’ve looked into ecosia and they store IPs for a week to “protect ourselves from spammers”. They encrypt your searches, use Bing for results and ads, but they filter the “annoying” ones. I think they are pretty good overall.
I use DuckDuckGo at home, but at work it’s blocked. I’ve argued for it to be unblocked but to no avail. I use Startpage at work because it appears to have the same results as Google but also lets you view images anonymously when possible.
Kagi.
Go to https://searx.space and enjoy (one of these instances is mine).
I host an instance of searxng and I am quite happy with it. It displays results of a combination of engines. If you want to spin up your own, I have a blog that explains how to do in basic steps : https://mustafacanyucel.com/blog/blog-13.html
Can Farside be used for the browser search box or do you mean visit Farside as a one-time thing to find an instance?
I’m not sure I’m following, so I’ll answer the question for both of the ways I can interpret that question.
If you mean to use
site:operator in your <favorite-search-engine>, I don’t think you can.You can use it to choose your instance once, but why not to always use it?
You can use it in the URL bar. Except the domain itself, the rest of the URL is remaining the same.
https://gооglе.соm/search?q=nyan cat would become https://farside.link/whoogle/search?q=nyan cat.
(You can do https://search.garudalinux.org/search?q=nyan cat, but Farside is fantastic.)
Whoa that’s awesome! Think this might be a better solution than LibRedirect for me.
I forgot to mention, it gives you Google results without tracking, or any ads.
I use DDG. I read here that start page had been taken over by an advertising company, and Brave always felt dodgy from day 1, weird crypto stuff
and I think the owners previous company may have sold users data.I think DDG is the best we have right now.
and Brave always felt dodgy
You mean like DDG, which had multiple privacy whoopsies like allowing Microsoft to track you? Or (in contrast to Brave) is not even OSS?
I think the owners previous company may have sold users data.
You mean like the founder and CEO of DDG who build, ran and sold a social network?
Not saying “don’t use DDG” or “Brave is the coolest!!!11”, but be aware that you can use your arguements against Brave against DDG as well.
And if you’re looking for a better alternative, I would say Ecosia is probably among the cleanest players out there. They only benefit Microsoft, because their service is built on Bing (as is DDG in part btw.).
