Different Search Engine's have different level of Privacy?

[rplogesrao]

Hi Ubuntu Community.

I have a question regarding Search Engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo or DuckDuckGo.

I heard that Google is not safe for Personal Privacy. Google associates with the Government or any advertising companies to target their specific customers. As I know, this is true and most people know about this.

But my question is, if let say I stopped using Google and switch to Bing or any other search engine, is the Privacy really safe? Does this means, the third party cannot access to our Privacy or there is still chances?

I hope you guys understand my question. Thank you.

[vasa1]

Microsoft says that Bing is absolutely safe. I think you should switch to Bing.

[Elfy]

Thread moved to The Cafe.

[Impavidus]

Big Brother requires Google to tell everything Google knows when Big Brother asks for it. Big Brother requires the same from any search engine or any other website or ISP. The only thing that would keep your private data save is only using an encrypted connection to a search engine based in a country where Big Brother has nothing to say. Iceland or so, but I'm not aware of any Icelandic search engines. Even then, they may have been hacked.

Or never send anything remotely private to any search engine, or accept you're being spied upon.

[grahammechanical]

Do they not have privacy policies that we can read? Every registered Company or Corporation associates with legimate governments in one way or another. Especially if they want governent contracts.

Last night I was watching an interview on BBC TV with a lawyer who is making up a report for the United Nations on the subject of the infringment of privacy by governents. He was asked about the Snowden revelations and he said, when I first heard about that I said to myself: Why is anybody surprised? This man assumes that if he uses any public service such Gmail then he will have no privacy. Why are people surprised about this?

A quote from the Bing Privacy Statement.


we may use search query data for the purpose of personalising the ads we display to you as you use our services or those of our advertising partners.

I use Bing as an example because you used Bing as an example. My use of Bing as an example should not be construed as meaning anything negative regarding Microsoft and any of its products or services. There, that should satisfy Microsoft's lawyers! :) Just in case my privacy is violated after I click "Post Quick Reply."

Regards.

[Habitual]

Governmental requests

Startpage is headquartered in The Netherlands, Europe. Any request or demand from any government (including the US) to deliver user data, will be thoroughly checked by our lawyers, and we will not comply unless the law which actually applies to us would undeniably require it from us. And even in that hypothetical situation, we would refer to the fact we have no personal user data to share.
In the fourteen years we've been in business, we have never received such a request.

https://startpage.com/eng/?

[buzzingrobot]

The net is a public space. Would anyone expect privacy in, say, a stadium filled with tens of thousands of other people? Or, walking down the street? Do we expect people not to see us?

Why, then, do we expect to be invisible on the net? If we were actually invisible, the thing would not work at all. (Packets need to find you, remember.)

We leave traces of ourselves all over the net, all over the planet, every time we use it. There is nothing we can do about that except try to hide (encryption) or complete avoidance.

Avoidance is no more practical than refusing to be seen in public. Encryption isn't practical for mainstream use.

If you don't want something on the net, don't put it there. Otherwise, you are dependent on people deciding not to look.

(And don't expect much privacy if you aren't paying for a service. Free services see the data we generate as the product they are in business to sell.)

(Also, don't be paranoid.)

[hoopia]

I use DuckDuckGo which I found to be a great search engine once I got used to the features. Google Search will track you by default, but you can limit this by different plugins (Ghostery, Adblock Plus, etc.).

I would highly suggest reading the Terms of Agreement and Privacy Policy provided by each of these search engines, so you get a better idea of how they operate.

[monkeybrain20122]

I use DuckDuckGo which I found to be a great search engine once I got used to the features. Google Search will track you by default, but you can limit this by different plugins (Ghostery, Adblock Plus, etc.).

I would highly suggest reading the Terms of Agreement and Privacy Policy provided by each of these search engines, so you get a better idea of how they operate.

Problem with DDG is it doesn't find things I can find easily on Google. of course you shouldn't keep your google account always logged in (as in mobile) and you can use addons like do not track. But in the end I am not really worried about being tracked by search engine, it is some data mining software, not some person sniffing through your closet to look for your personal items, and my life is not that interesting to warrant special attentions, and yours is probably also as boring and common.

People who are on the internet a lot (social media etc) should know that there is no real privacy, it is like going to a nude beach and afraid of being seen naked. Believe me you are not as attractive in the nude as you think you are. :) You just blend in with the crowd. Having said that it doesn't mean you shouldn't exercise some caution but a lot of it is just common sense. There are people who splash all their life story on social media and then wonder why they are being harrassed.

[hoopia]

Problem with DDG is it doesn't find things I can find easily on Google. of course you shouldn't keep your google account always logged in (as in mobile) and you can use addons like do not track. But in the end I am not really worried about being tracked by search engine, it is some data mining software, not some person sniffing through your closet to look for your personal items, and my life is not that interesting to warrant special attentions, and yours is probably also as boring and common.


Google is the superior engine but I think for my day to day I've never really had a problem with DDG. There are times where I will go back to Google for more difficult queries, or things that I should know exist on the Internet but DDG isn't picking up on.


Believe me you are not as attractive in the nude as you think you are. :)

Speak for yourself. ;)

[rplogesrao]

Well, Yes that is true. Why do you want to hide youself in this Virtual world? If you not doing bad things, you no need to hide. But i just feel unsecure by the Freedom. People call it as, Internet Freedom. Yes, if i do something bad, you can still track me, but my question is why you need to do that always. These Seach Engines knows what every each person search about and those advertisement people take advantages from this. But its not ending there, they can still identify where am i living and so on. This can cause huge Privacy problem to the People. This is what i really concern about.

If they can only track what you are searching about, that is still OK. But they still can track you until where are you living, what are you doing and even who is your neighbour. So, this is soo Not OK.

[buzzingrobot]

Every search engine is subject to the laws of the country where it is located, as well as the countries it operates in. A seach engine business can raise a challenge in the courts if it thinks a request for data is not lawful, as Google and others have, just as an individual can challenge a subpoena. That does not mean the challenge will succeed, and it also does not mean that government requests for data are, in every case, illegitimate.

The data that search engines and other online service collect is, for the most part, data that's collected in ways that have been baked into the operation of the net for years. After all, it's a network; your IP is embedded in every packet you generate. If a search engine did not briefly retain info about each query, they'd not be able to send the response to the browser that sent the query. The issue isn't about the existence of the data, it's about it's retention and use.

A business -- search engine, mail provider, etc., that claims to evade these data requests, or actually does evade them, ought not to be trusted. If nothing else, a business that gets caught breaking the law is subject to pressure from the authorities to cooperate with it secretly.