Disturbing news for #privacy enthusiasts: the most privacy-respecting search service in the world (#Ombrelo¹) has permanently closed their doors due to lack of support.

I am gutted. It’s another win for our top digital rights adversary (#Cloudflare).

¹ https://ombrelo.im5wixghmfmt7gf7wb4xrgdm6byx2gj26zn47da6nwo7xvybgxnqryid.onion/

@rzeta0 @Privacymatters
#DuckDuckGo is #PrivacyTheater:

http://techrights.org/2021/03/15/duckduckgo-in-2021/

Avoid #DDG.

The single most privacy-respecting search service is #Ombrelo:

https://ombrelo.im5wixghmfmt7gf7wb4xrgdm6byx2gj26zn47da6nwo7xvybgxnqryid.onion/

But note that it’s more of a nerd service for advanced users.

@hobbsc It’s unclear if you are saying Cloudflare is unavoidable for admins or for visitors. Either way, CF /is/ avoidable by both admins and users.

Still today ½ of all websites in the world prove that CF is avoidable w.r.t administration. Only lazy & incompetant admins use it.

For users it’s difficult to avoid CF but I have been doing so for years. First, you can use a search service that down-ranks all CF sites in the results (#Ombrelo):

https://ombrelo.im5wixghmfmt7gf7wb4xrgdm6byx2gj26zn47da6nwo7xvybgxnqryid.onion/

There are a variety of non-CF frontends for walled gardens like youtube, stackexchange, google translate, reddit, etc. When there is no front-end, you have archive.ORG and 12ft.io.

There are browser plugins that detect when you have clicked on a Cloudflare website which then automatically redirects you to the archive.org version. There are plugins that put a strikethrough on all CF links that appear on a webpage you render. So if you use a search service other than Ombrelo, you can still easily steer clear of them.

When I need to /interact/ with a CF pusher, I do so offline, which often means calling, faxing, emailing or writing paper letters. When a bank starts using CF to wall me off away from my money, I close the account and switch banks.

@CppGuy @marijn

@alex @SoniEx2

The only search service that I would give a green light to is #Ombrelo:
https://ombrelo.im5wixghmfmt7gf7wb4xrgdm6byx2gj26zn47da6nwo7xvybgxnqryid.onion/

Ombrelo is the only search service in the world that tags #Cloudflare sites in the results and pushes them down, and redirects them to the archive.org mirror.

@mariyadelano I start by searching on #Ombrelo:

http://ombrelo.im5wixghmfmt7gf7wb4xrgdm6byx2gj26zn47da6nwo7xvybgxnqryid.onion/

That’s a privacy-respecting search service that filters out Cloudflare garbage. But still, the web is fully enshitified, so I control-click links that look relevent then I have to filter out more enshitified garbage by hitting control-pgdwn to cycle through the tabs and control-w on CAPTCHAs, popups, cookie walls, paywalls, etc. At that point, there is often nothing left, because the web is so enshitified now. So then I try these search services:

* search.marginalia.nu
* frogfind.com
* wiby.me

If I’m still short on info, I search:

* mojeek.co.uk
* search.fabiomanganiello.com

but of course that’s even broader and has more garbage to sort through.

We really need a time machine to take us back to the 90s. The closest thing we have to that is marginalia.nu and wiby.me.