DuckDuckGo Browser Caught Tracking Websites Visited By User

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[–]asdfzsdf 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (8 children)

Do some further research before spreading misinformation. This has been fixed & merged into master: https://github.com/duckduckgo/Android/pull/878

[–][deleted] 7 insightful - 2 fun7 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

Do some further research before spreading misinformation

I wouldn't necessarily call this misinformation, it is more like an opinion. The fact that this data effectively gave them logs of the sites their users where visiting on their phones for God knows how long is very alarming only because they are deceiving people into a false sense of security.

[–]Jesus 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (3 children)

Yup, duckduckgo is owned by a Weinberg. I have proof that they hide forums and controversial subjects. Weinberg even admited in an interview that they mite certain forums and put the mainstream most relevant subjects at the too. Forums and blogs from real people are all but hidden from the forst page.

This has been a recent occurance that I have noticed. Duckduckgo is controlled. Use Seerx.xyz. And turn off duckduckgo ans google on the settinngs list. You'll get far more information by non-corporate shills.

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

I had no idea, I don't think this is common knowledge. Between that and DDG sourcing their results from the big guys, it does not sound worthwhile whatsoever.

[–]Jesus 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

It is not worthwhile. Most people believe it is a good privacy orientated alternative to google. I have my doubts. The owner, Weinberg, had made it clear in a few videos that they index articles and disregard forums and blogs. So, in reality, they censor what independent people write and post.

Searx instances are good but you have to make sure you use one that doesn't have Google or Duckduckgo on in its settings. There are many options that searx can use to compile web searches. You can even build your own server.

I did, for awhile, github has insteuctions on how to do this but it was too much data. But I was able to compare duckduckgo search results and search reaults with the big players including duckduckgo off so Searx didn't index their results. And all the controversial blogs and forums were at the top.

For example, I typed in the "Lindbergh baby kidnapping conspiracy forums"

For duckduckgo, and google everything was about Lindbergh secretly killing his baby because he sympathized with the nazis because he was an isolationist.

Almost every result was mainstream crap.

Then I searched the same thing in searx with the big players turned off and I was able to get all the controversial forums i cluding the forum which had the substance on Warburg's connection to the killing through the lindbergh kidnapper and the book written about it which one would not be able to find or even know about if they had used Dickduckgo.

[–]Jesus 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Spelling is subpar.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

This was still sketchy af and DuckDuckGo is also sketchy in the search results it produces. StartPage is slightly better

[–]wrongthink 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I could be remembering this wrong but I thought last year startpage sold itself to a shady company.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Quite possible. I mean, they need to make money to keep their servers running. The only private search engine is one you build yourself by scraping the net. Outside of that, privacy is a pipe dream with search engines

[–]bald-janitor 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

I always knew they were a bunch of scammers, google will never allow anyone seriously challenging them!

[–][deleted] 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Well, that is basically how I have always felt about it... A private search engine is too good to be true, you have to scrape the web yourself if you want that

[–]BravoVictor 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (12 children)

Sounds like a non-story.

  1. It only effects their Android app, not their regular website
  2. It's not tracking user data, it's just retrieving the site's favicon in a format that can be displayed in the app. Otherwise they'd have to bloat up the app's code with image processing functionality to retrieve and convert all the various image formats. Much easier to just setup a tiny server somewhere that the app can just query.

If you think sending data to DuckDuckGo is being used to track you...you're already sending them data in the form of search queries that can also be used to track you. You either trust them when they say they're not tracking you or you don't. This news doesn't change anything.

If you're truly so paranoid as to think they're tracking you, you can always hack your phone's DNS to point the domain "icons.duckduckgo.com" to localhost or something so it can't retrieve anything.

Even better, you should be using incognito browser behind a VPN.

[–][deleted] 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (3 children)

It only effects their Android app, not their regular website

It's not tracking user data, it's just retrieving the site's favicon in a format that can be displayed in the app.

The fact that it only effects their Android app is even more alarming considering the security vulnerabilities on phones. It is a story because it is a terrible look for a company which markets itself on its value of privacy, that is all.

[–]BravoVictor 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

is even more alarming considering the security vulnerabilities on phones.

I've had an Android phone for a decade. I've never had any security problems, nor heard of anyone who has.

It is a story because it is a terrible look for a company which markets itself on its value of privacy, that is all.

No, it doesn't, and the fact that you can't explain why only proves your pushing baseless fear mongering to the point where you're pretty clearly just trolling now.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I've had an Android phone for a decade. I've never had any security problems, nor heard of anyone who has.

You're being naive. Have you heard of the damn NSA and the PRISM program? Your phone is literally a surveillance device, if you can't see how, I can't convince you. Either way, DuckDuckGo is hosted on Amazon's servers and they are legally obliged to hand over any data they have to the NSA and other law enforcement agencies. If they were logging this kind of data, it so doesn't look good for them

[–]kokolokoNightcrawler 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Lmao, I was arguing this idiot earlier...

I've had an Android phone for a decade. I've never had any security problems, nor heard of anyone who has.

Hand on Bible, that's gotta be the dumbest sentence I've read on Saidit since I joined. So many negative IQ redditor NPC's came in lately, really bringing the mood down.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (7 children)

If you think sending data to DuckDuckGo is being used to track you...you're already sending them data in the form of search queries that can also be used to track you.

I totally believe this. You just have to do a cost benefit analysis on each use.

Even better, you should be using incognito browser behind a VPN.

I personally use StartPage because their policies seem more transparent than DuckDuckGo. I believe DuckDuckGo censors results and favors advertisers way too easily. Either way, we use these services as proxies to Google, all searches go through Google.

[–]SeasonedReason 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

What does "we use these services as proxies to Google, all searches go through Google" mean?

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

It means just what I said. DuckDuckGo and StartPage aggregate search results from other search engines, mainly Google. You just use them as a proxy server to make it difficult for Google to track you.

[–]BravoVictor 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

DuckDuckGo and StartPage aggregate search results from other search engines, mainly Google.

Yes and no. Here's what DDG says it gets its results from, which does include other search engines like Bing and Google, but also it's own custom crawler and adapters for sites like Wikipedia. They're not just a proxy for Google Search.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

They're not just a proxy for Google Search.

Yeah they are also a tool for Microsoft and other massive international monopolies to push their junk on you at the very least.

[–]SeasonedReason 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I read this page, https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/sources/ It refutes your statement.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Wow, that is definitely an unbiased independent source. I don't buy it, I don't think it refutes anything and I'm not taking the claims of a PR statement at face value.

We also of course have more traditional links in the search results, which we also source from multiple partners, though most commonly from Bing (and none from Google).

This much is probably true, only StartPage uses the Google API directly out of the two but you have to realize Google's stranglehold is not just through search, they have trackers on something like 80-90% of the web. They know what you're searching for, end of story.

What bothers me is that DuckDuckGo often just gives me the same results as Google anyway. This is because they clearly take advertising money from the same people. When you can literally pay DuckDuckGo to push your link to the top of the search results, Google and DuckDuckGo will end up displaying similar results when ad money is involved. Even when that isn't the case, DuckDuckGo is not the end all solution to your search problems. Bottom line is this, DuckDuckGo may not create an individual profile on you and tailor results to that profile like Google does but they advertise based on keywords and engagement obviously. It doesn't matter if you use a VPN. It is better to just use something like StartPage because it lets you use Google without the personalized profile and tailored search results while aggregating the results with other search engines. To me personally, DuckDuckGo and Google are two sides to the same coin because they both seem to make it difficult to find what I'm looking for

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I read this page, https://help.duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/sources/ It refutes your statement.

I read this page and it refutes your naivety. You're basically exchanging Google for Microsoft and neither care about you having privacy, both care about good PR

[–]m68k 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

TIL DuckDuckGo has their own browser.

[–]RuskinF 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (8 children)

This information is fake. You have to focus on DuckDuckGo. It was a bug and they found it and replaced it and solved it for once and for all.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

This information is fake. You have to focus on DuckDuckGo

Look at the rest of the thread. We did focus on DuckDuckGo and I'm still not convinced it wasn't a problem.

[–]Jesus 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

DuckDuckGo is also censoring articles that expose Zionism ; a so-called privacy orientated search engine is owned by Gabriel Weinberg ; he says he blocks Content Milling, but that includes many sties where thousands of indepedent users post every day!

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

DuckDuckGo is also censoring articles that expose Zionism

How do you think I picked up on their censorship? You can never find what you're looking for if you search for certain subjects.

[–]Jesus 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Through the blocking ofwhat they call "low-tier" content milling. Such as indepedent blogs and forums.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Saidit shows up in Google's search results... Google is indexing us!

[–]Jesus 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Yes, they are. I'm referring to indexing forums and small blogs. It is usually in regards to specific topics.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

No you're right, I was just pointing out Google has a different policy on this. DDG has different methods tied to Bing, right? I wouldn't be surprised if DDG backend ignored crawling a site like Saidit altogether

[–]Jesus 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

DuckDuckGo censors controversial forums through indexing mainstream articles instead. It has only been a recent change. Weinberg admits to it.