What is the most private search engine today?

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1

Hi all,

Been looking around for a private search engine lately, a lot of sources say DuckDuckGo, but they once had Microsoft trackers. I did see some say SearX, Startpage, etc. What does r/privacy think about what is the most private search engine today?

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Due to Reddit deciding to sell access to the user generated content on their platform to monetized AI companies, killing of 3rd party apps by introducing API changes, and their track history of cooperating with the oppressive regime of the CCP, I have decided to withdraw all my submissions.
I am truly sorry if anyone needs an answer I provided, you can reach out to me at [email protected] and I will try my best to help you

3

Searx for sure, you can host your own private instance or use a public instance.

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If you want to install:

https://github.com/searxng/searxng-docker

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List of public instances:

4

My feeling is no alternative search engine is perfect (or anywhere close to it)

Some options:

  1. DDG my favorite, the most popular, and sufficiently private if you are reasonably informed about what it does and doesn’t do. But the results aren’t great and they are overly dependent on MS (this may he changing). !bangs are one of there killer features, and they offer probably tue most complete and polished solution on the list.
  2. Startpage is an option if all you want is proxied/private Google search results. They are owned by an advertising company but there is no indication they have exploited SP users. They also have a proxy feature which helps differentiate them.
  3. Brave Search still in Beta, trying to build their own web crawler, has promise, but somewhat limited in features/results, and many people are uncomfortable with the company behind Brave.
  4. Self hosted options like SearX and Whoogle what you need to know about these is that they are not search engines they are search engine software. There is no SearX or Whoogle website you can go to or put your trust in. They are meant to be self hosted by individuals. So if you are using a public instance you are trusting an individual unaffiliated with either project to (1) be ethical, and (2) be competent. Also be aware in the case of searX each instance can be configured differently and will use different sources depending on preferences of the host. SearX is a ‘metasearch’ they can be configured to get results from many sources including Google, DDG, Bing, Qwant, etc, whereas Whoogle gets results from Google only.
  5. Others (Qwant, Ecosia, Metager, Mojeek, etc) are smaller, more niche, or at least less known to me. I have briefly sampled each but not enough to comment with authority.
5

but they once had Microsoft trackers. if you clicked on Microsoft ads

^ This applied to the DDG app, not the search engine. This was not an issue that affected the search engine (since its just a search engine not a tracker blocker).

I dont recommend DDG as a browser (there are better options), I do recommend it as a search engine.

6

Startpage I use along with Brave

7

I like brave search: https://search.brave.com

8

Who cares about the most private search engine? You should care about the best search engine that is sufficiently private.

i.e asking your query to a tree branch is pretty private

9

Obviously it depends on how you define most private. That depends on your personal perspective and situation. And notably on how data you pass on, when you search, is used, stored, transferred and processed.

Things to consider (self-disclosure - Mojeek search engine CEO):

  • How might your IP address be handled?
  • Is your search query and other data passed on to another company (often Microsoft and sometimes Google)?
  • Is other data (eg browser, search query, time/date, page requested, referral data) sold or transferred to other companies or data brokers?
  • Do any companies get the IP address, or part of an IP address?
  • What services are you signed into when you search? What happens if you are signed into Google but using Startpage, or signed into Microsoft but using Duck?
  • What browser are you using and how are you using it?
  • What cookies are being used by search service or search engine?
  • What companies might be fingerprinting using data they receive and have collectd in the paste?
  • Is AI being used, or to be used in the future to fingerprint?

Your combination, in particular, of OS/browser/search matters. Choose carefully: https://www.mojeek.com/support/browsers/

10

SearX.

I’m using its Tiekoetter instance.

11

My own Searx, but it took me a while to get there. After trying this one, that one, trying to keep up with which good this month, and what new thing is discovered and now something else is recommended…I just decided to give it a try. It’s all I use now.

12

I like https://presearch.com/

13

Swisscows, Presearch, Quant, Brave, Mojeek, Gibiru, Metager.

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One search engine always missing from these threads: Presearch. It’s a privacy respecting distributed search engine, meaning your search will be processed by one of currently 73.000 community operated nodes. Also, not that it’ll make you rich, but you get a small amount of their native PRE token simply using it…

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16

I like startpage and brave search.

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The open source SearX.

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SearxNG + Whoogle, and then DDG, Startpage, Brave, Qwant, Mojeek and the rest

There are many, but honestly none of them are great.

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your computer spies on you. your browser spies on you. your ISP spies on you. The search engine is just a piece of it.

20

DDG could be your easy bet. They use Yandex and Bing results.

But you could try some of the SEARX public instances (or run your own instance in your home). They are basically a proxy (they do more than that) that lets you use the main search engines like google without exposing yourself to them. I’m using them and I’m not seeing any content related to my searches popping up anywhere as suggested content, so it must be doing its job. Another nice thing is that they also have automatic redirection to alternative sites that show you the content in a safer enviroment (proxy pages). You can disable that too.

SEARX is open and has a github.