Geeks Ocean

Best Search Engines for Privacy and Security

Anmol Chauhan
Anmol Chauhan
May 23, 2020
Best Search Engines for Privacy and Security

The use of a private search engine, such as StartPage or DuckDuckGo, is becoming increasingly necessary. Most privacy-focused alternatives typically use massive search engines to return data, but proxy search requests such that Google, Yahoo or Microsoft may not know who searched. In other words, they see only that the question was found, not the person who found for it.

Such privacy search engines pledge not to log your IP address or any request you make, unlike Google and other search engine giants. If you want the advantages of rapid access to the information given by the search engine without giving up your privacy, read on.

Does Google Know About Me?

The trouble with most search engines is that you are being spyed on. This is their business philosophy – to know as much about you as you can, to deliver highly targeted ads directly to your browser window.

Google has also recently lifted its ban on mixing what it discovers through searching your emails with what it knows about you through your searches. It's just easier to spy on you. Data usually collected and processed at every time you make a request includes:

  1. Your IP address
  2. The date and time that you made the query
  3. The query search terms
  4. A cookie ID

Best Private Search Engines:

1. DuckDuckGo-

DuckDuckGo is one of the most popular privacy-oriented search engines that can be used as an alternative to Google. The user interface of DuckDuckGo is commendable, must say, "It's unique in itself."

DuckDuckGo is “The Search Engine that Vows Not to Track You”. Gabriel Weinberg, the CEO and founder of DuckDuckGo, said “if the FBI comes to us, we have nothing to tie back to you.”

PROS:

  1. DuckDuckGo provides search recommendations as you type in your query.
  2. Search returns are quick.
  3. Includes the returns of image and video search.
  4. Findings are presented clearly.
  5. Filter search categories include: Site, Images , Videos, Items, Definitions, Interpretation, and News.
  6. The filters shown are adaptive. Initially, DDG will display the results under the filter category that it finds most relevant to the search words.
  7. Ads can also be shown but are clearly labelled, confidential, and never mixed with "pure" search returns.
  8. Video results show a preview of the thumbnail.
  9. You can play videos of YouTube directly from the DDG. A warning alerts you that they will be monitored by YouTube / Google.
  10. Results can also be classified by country and date (Anytime, Last Day, Last Week or Last Month).
  11. Subjectively, the efficiency of DuckDuckGo 's search is very strong. However, I've seen reports from others who don't consider them as interesting as those from Google.

CONS:

Image findings can be filtered only by size (Small , Medium, Large).


2. SearX-

SearX is flexible with public and self-hosted options, the latter of which is unmatched in privacy.

Less well known but rapidly gaining popularity with the security community is SearX. Not only is SearX completely open-source, but it's easy to set up and run your own instance of it.

There's an official public instance of SearX, or you can use one of a variety of voluntary public bodies. But what SearX really is about is going to run your own case. This makes SearX the only metasearch that keeps no logs!

PROS:

  1. SearX leverages results from a large number of search engines by default.
  2. Users can change which search engines are used in Preferences.
  3. The searches can be filtered by: General, Data, Photos, IT, Maps (using OpenStreetMap), Music, News, Science, Social Media, and Videos.
  4. Searches can also be filtered by time.
  5. There are no advertisements in there.
  6. Wikipedia entries are displayed on the right side of the search results.
  7. The results of the search can be downloaded as a .csv,.json, or .rss file.
  8. The results of the search can be viewed proxied. This will "break" several websites, but it does allow for a very high degree of privacy.
  9. The search results are as good as the selected engine. By default, the official instance uses Google , Bing, Wikipedia, and a host of other first-rate engines, so the results are excellent.
  10. Video results should show a preview of the thumbnail. Clicking on a video will take you to the website where you are hosted.

CONS:

  1. Suggestions for search are not provided.
  2. There are no external filters for Images, but a preview will be shown when they are tapped.


3. Disconnect Search-

Disconnect aims to satisfy all your security needs-from VPNs to browser extensions.

The US-based company has made a name for itself with some excellent open-source privacy-oriented browser extensions over the last few years. Several of these is the open-source Disconnect Search add-on for Firefox and Chrome.

PROS:

  1. Searches are typically made from an add-on to the browser.
  2. You can choose which of the three search engines to query: Bing, Yahoo or DuckDuckGo (default).
  3. Unlike other privacy metasearch engines mentioned in this article, Disconnect does not show search returns on its own website. Results are simply routed through the Disconnect servers to mask their origin and are then displayed on the web page of the selected search engine.
  4. Searches in incognito mode are supported.


4. StartPage-

Startpage.com and Ixquick are run by the same organization. In the past, Startpage.com returned Google results, while Ixquick returned results from a variety of other search engines, but not from Google. These systems have now been merged, and all return the same Google results.

Although not actively sponsored, the old Ixquick metasearch engine is still available at Ixquick.eu. Interestingly, despite no longer being actively supported, Startpage.com recently removed the Yahoo results from the legacy search engine. It is in reaction to the reports that Yahoo has helped the NSA spy on its users.

PROS:

  1. Search returns are fast, but not as fast as those of DuckDuckGo.
  2. Searches are presented clearly.
  3. An advanced search tool is available that allows you to determine a number of search criteria, and the results can be filtered by time.

CONS:

  1. Suggestions are not provided as the default form, but this can be allowed in the settings.
  2. Searches can only be indexed by categories of Site, Photos and Video.


5. Peekier-

Peekier brings positive updates to the traditional search engine.

Peekier is a modern search engine for no-logs. Unlike the previous one, it is not a metasearch engine, but has introduced its own algorithm. It might not be the fastest search engine I've ever used, but it's exciting to see how search engines will improve in the near future.

When you type a search query, it not only retrieves a list of results, but also shows the preview images of the web pages mentioned. So, you get a "peek" at what you're looking for. Although your data is not stored in the search engine, the web portals you visit track you.

So, to prevent that to some degree, Peekier accesses the web and produces a preview image to determine whether or not to go to the web (without the need to access it). In this way, you allow fewer websites to learn about you, mainly those you trust.

Conclusion

Using either of these resources engines would dramatically enhance the privacy of your search. Essentially, your searches will not be registered to help you create a profile that is used to sell products to you. All the search engines I've looked at in this article are easy to use and produce good results.

Can these systems shield your searches from government monitoring (and, in particular, the NSA)? It is best to say that it is not in the case of US firms. But if you don't do something very illegal, it may not concern you (though it should).