Privacy @lemmy.ml

1y ago

Search engines compared

111 comments

This is a bad diagram
- Yeah.
  The columns are squished together so the titles are basically one word and the data creates a ton of empty space. The colors should be lighter shades. White on yellow is just annoying. The row separators don't extend to the row header, so it is easy to get lost when trying to compare the actual data.
  My eyes just get confused and nope out.
  
  Also the actual diagram is bad.

Brave Search fully using their own index since April 27, 2023. But they refuse to identify their crawler and rely on googlebot if sites want to be excluded. Also their search API monetization of possible copyrighted content while understandable is a bit doubious due to their public stance on transparency.
StartPage also blocks VPN usage.
DuckDuckGo by their own admission now re-rank "trusted" sites to the top when it comes to what they clasify as"misinformation" so calling their "censorship" mild is huge understatement.
- If I wanted to search for unverified info or misinfo, I could, but almost always I am lookkng for factual and sourced information. Please don't force me to do otherwise.
  
  It's more about someone else making the decision on what is "trustworthy" for you
- StartPage also blocks VPN usage.
  Only accidental I think. They have the option of reporting that you're behind a VPN proxy when it happens.
  
  Didn't have an issue since a year. Think they changed sth (airvpn)
- StartPage also blocks VPN usage.
  Ancedotal but Startpage works perfectly fine with VPN for me. Certainly better than Google, which works but requires a lot of annoying captchas.
  
  I used Startpage for a long time, and I'm perpetually connected to VPN on both my PC and my phone (different nodes at different times)
  Never had a problem with my VPN

Interesting that you're doing a search engine comparison, and not add google into that comparison. Also, there are no sources at all, so we can't verify any of it, and I know that some of that data is incorrect. Sources would help us (the end user) determine whether our data is incorrect or yours is incorrect due to poor sources. Leaving out the sources, means this chart is actually rather pointless, because it can't be verified (as correct or incorrect).
E: also, ignoring cloudflare with this statement and zero explanation, removes author credibility. Either explain exactly why "cloudflare so who cares lol" or don't include that section at all.
This chart reminds me of this, which was actually quoted in a presentation as an actual quote...
- The chart source is from here: https://digdeeper.club/articles/search.xhtml
  Cloudflare makes you activate cookies and JavaScript, which serves to deanonymize you.
  
  I couldn't quite believe the Cloudflare thing, so I loaded up a new Firefox profile, disabled all cookies, and disabled JavaScript and accessed one of my websites that sits behind cloudflare and... It worked just fine.
  Do you have more info on that? Is it only in certain cases?
- It was made by an edgelord for edgelords.
  CuckCuckGo belongs in the trash instead.

shouldn’t that category be “SearXNG” instead of “SearX”? – SearX went into maintenance mode a year ago and then archived their code last week – searx.space isn’t even bothering to list SearX instances anymore
- Kinda bummed about that because some of the instances I liked were SearX, but I guess it's time to move on.

How about Kagi?
- I'm not impressed with Kagi. I was lied to by someone at Kagi when I asked a question about their using geo-location data.
  (Well, technically not lied to, but it was clear they were being deliberately evasive and deceptive, which didn't impress me much, since it's a paid service I was considering.)
  Edit.
  Obviously, my take may be biased, so I've added screenshots from the exchange I had with Kagi, but I've blotted out all names for privacy. Even though this left a bad taste in my mouth, I hope I'm not depicting this unfairly, so now you can decide for yourself.
  Edit: If you're tempted to respond in bad faith, go annoy someone else. I'm not taking the bait, I'll just block your ass.
  Edit Part 2: Why do all my comments attract the most insufferable neckbeards?
  A. It's clear why I found it deceptive since he was being a pedant about what constitutes search results (if a widget is summoned by a search term -- which didn't request it btw -- then that widget is part of the results. It's batshit looney to think otherwise)
  B. But I literally posted screenshots for full disclosure and for the sake of honesty -- and I'm still getting losers posting cringe in response. Fucking suburbanite straight white male energy stfu
  C. Get blocked, fuckwits. If I wanted your opinion, I'd ask.
  
  Which part of that replay was deceptive?
  
  I don't think that's (intentionally) deceptive, it seems like two people talking past each other... I've been frustrated with customer support at a lot of places, I don't take it to mean those places are bad though. Good customer support is expensive and hard.
  Thanks for sharing though, I'll keep that in the back of my mind.
  Edit: I'm also curious why you care if they serve you geolocated results? That might be part of what the support agent was confused by.
  ... also maybe tone it down a bit, I don't think that other guy was trying to bait you and get you all hyped up.
  
  Legitimately, what part of that was deceptive? They outright stated that those specialized widgets you can't disable. Your post here is far more misleading in comparison.

I just love what has become of this thread:
Think it's a nice post
Look for Google/Kagi, but they're missing
People ask for sources, realize OP has chart from VERY dodgy conspiracy website
People start accusing Kagi Support of lying to their face, Screenshota of convo attached
Other users don't think its a lie, rather a misunderstanding
Insults start
?
- Nice summary

Is cloudflare bad?
- bad in the sense that its 1 (american) company that controls a hellala lot of the internet

You? Me?

Why is Brave Search considered as heavily censored?
- Because it doesn't show the conspiracy theory enhancing the authors conspiracy anti-covid/anti-moon landing opinion :
  meaning you will never find the truth about the moon landing or COVID vaccines there even if the query asks for exactly that. What you will find - though - is a bunch of irrelevant "fact check" or "science loving" sites, or ones shitting on "conspiracy theorists".
  
  Ahhh that's reasonable. Thank you for the info!
  
  Leaving out all other conspiracy theories, since I may agree with some of them, the claim that the moon landing was staged strikes me as mindblowing over everything else. You just need to look at the Moon wath a telescope to disprove it, no need to believe to any scientist.

Are the Ecosia results up to date? They used to be great, but awhile ago they changed something and it's been hot garbage since. I still use them because trees, but I usually search with Ecosia, don't see what I want, and then have to use another search engine.

Today I learned WebCrawler still exists.
- First search engine I ever used in the 90s

Nifty. Did you make this op?
- Nope, I got it from here: https://digdeeper.club/articles/search.xhtml
  
  after looking around on that site, i deeply mistrust the original author about probably everything. using the search term "christchurch shooting was faked" and arguing that the search results attack conspiracy theories, which means that there is censoring going on - that does not fit my definition of sanity.
  e: ah, and the moon landing was fake and covid shots are evil. dudes, this guy is nuts, dont even take the time of the day from him.

There is something that is irrefutable that sadly google has the best algorithm and most crawled information. So it has by far the best results using it correctly with parameters. Sometimes I fall to use it but i take my precautions like in a separate container using Firefox Multi account containers and some other stuff
- It's refutable, and also you can use Google's results through a different search engine, like SearXNG
- Google used to be the ultimate engine 15 years ago. Now it's the same 5 sites and 10 ads over and over.

Do you have this in ods, csv or at least xlsx?
- God, this is what I love about Lemmy: Someome posts a chart and immediately the question for raw data arises. And the order: First .ods, the free spreasheet format, then .csv with the mindset of "Fine, I'll import the raw csv myself", and as anlast resort the hated .xlsx proprietary format. Never change, and use .od_

What is Metager?
- MetaGer is a German meta search engine (utilizing several search engines in the back). UI and results are of course available in many languages.
  https://metager.org | https://metager.de
  From their About page:
  What makes MetaGer special?
  MetaGer is different from other search engines. This is reflected not only in our public good orientation and focus on privacy, but also through some unique features:
  Possibility of creating a personal blacklist
  Function of the search in the search
  Advertising-free search possible
  Integration of search engine projects like YaCy
  The only German search engine that combines results from several large web indexes
  And much more..
  What We Stand For
  Guaranteed Privacy
  Data protection and privacy are important to us. That's why we don't track or store personal data and offer several services to protect your privacy, for example our anonymizing proxy ("Open Anonymously" feature).
  Non-Profit Association
  MetaGer is a project of the non-profit association SUMA-EV, Association for Free Access to Knowledge. SUMA-EV is primarily committed to promoting media literacy.
  Diverse and Free
  MetaGer produces diverse results because it is a metasearch engine. We have explained exactly what this means in our transparency statement. By publishing our source code, we show that free access to knowledge is important to us. Our source code is free and open source.
  100% Renewable Energy
  Sustainability and resource consumption is also a big issue for us. Therefore we pay attention to the energy consumption of our services and only use electricity from renewable energy sources.

Mixed in here are search engines and metasearch engines. Metasearch engines like DDG, Metager, and Searx are not actual search engines but rather sites that query other engines. I would rather see only actual search engines for comparison. I would like to see some non western (search engines based in non NATO aligned) countries included such as Yandex.
Data collection always happens. How does the engine know what to return if you did not send it a query(data)? Sometimes results are personalized/manipulated. Anonymity reduces impact of both.

Source? How is possible that Startpage is listed as Censorship: Extreme?
- Startpage is Google but proxied. And Google has extreme censorship.

Why should startpage be censored?
- Because the results are from google so their censorship applies. Startpage is only a google search proxy.
- For me this was food for thought: https://restoreprivacy.com/startpage-system1-privacy-one-group/

Excite still exists?

YaCy has entered the chat.

DuckDuckGo stores no IP addresses. https://duckduckgo.com/privacy
"We don’t save your IP address or any unique identifiers alongside your searches or visits to our websites. We also never log IP addresses or any unique identifiers to disk."

Can we get the back end added? Like ddg uses bing, so I want to find another one thats just as secure but doesn't use bing

But Cloudflare are awesome
- Cloudflare is becoming entrenched in every aspect of hosting. It's all fine and dandy until they're bought by the likes of Google, or Meta.
  
  I always thought Cloudflare could become shit by itself. I never thought about someone like Google buying them. Governments wouldn't allow such a monopoly, right, right? oh shit
  
  At which point I'll worry. Until then there are far better targets.
  
  So the argument is that they're too large, and nothing else?
- For me it's that they needlessly centralise the internet, and that's their goal too.
  Suddenly one data centre goes down and the whole internet will too.
  And data centres do go down, one of Google's most recent outages happened in an entire region and they were unable to badge into the building because that also relied on Google infrastructure.

DDG is not a search engine.
- Why isn't it?
  
  There is an actual duck doing the searching for you.
  
  It uses Bing and Yahoo. All it does is anonymize the query before it’s sent to them.
  Bing is a search engine. Yahoo is a search engine. Google Search is a search engine. DDG is just a broker in all this.
- And Firefox is not a browser?
  
  Edgy. DDG queries Bing and Yahoo mostly. All they do is anonymize the query before it’s sent to keep your searches private.
  Show me the DDG search engine.

111 comments

What makes MetaGer special?

What We Stand For

Guaranteed Privacy

Non-Profit Association

Diverse and Free

100% Renewable Energy