Privacy-centric tool advice sites -- Credibility examined -- part 1: web search engines (DDG & Qwant) - Lemmy
This is an examination of the integrity and credibility of the following
projects that attempt to advise privacy-focused consumers. | site | mission
statement of purpose | |â|â| | de-Google-ify
[https://markosaric.com/surveillance-capitalism/] | âThese ethical alternatives
will help you de-Google-ify your life, have a calmer and far less intrusive
online experience.â | | Frama [https://framasoft.org/en/] | âpromotion,
dissemination and development of free software, enhancement of open source
culture, and an online platform of open services.â (full charter
[https://framasoft.org/en/charte/]) | | PRISM-Break
[https://prism-break.org/en/] | âHelp make mass surveillance of entire
populations uneconomical! We all have a right to privacy, which you can exercise
today by encrypting your communications and ending your reliance on proprietary
services.â | | PTIO [https://privacytools.io/] | âYou are being watched. Private
and state-sponsored organizations are monitoring and recording your online
activities. PrivacyTools provides services, tools and knowledge to protect your
privacy against global mass surveillance.â | | Security Checklist
[https://securitycheckli.st/] | âAn open source checklist of resources designed
to improve your online privacy and security. Check things off to keep track as
you go.â | | Surveillance Self-Defense [https://ssd.eff.org/en] | âour [EFFâs]
expert guide to protecting you and your friends from online spying.â | |
Stallman [https://stallman.org] | (advice is tech freedom centric but RMS also
has a respectible stance on privacy issues) | | Switching Software
[https://switching.software] | âEthical, easy-to-use and privacy-conscious
alternatives to well-known softwareâ | | ThinkPrivacy [thinkprivacy.ch] | âItâs
your data. Itâs time you take control of it.â # Harmful endorsement: DuckDuckGo
(âDDGâ) Why itâs harmful: article [https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/31321] | site |
DuckDuckGo endorsement | siteâs position & mission are inconsistent |
endorsement or condemnation contains misinfo or withholds pitfalls | |â|â|â|â| |
de-Google-ify [https://markosaric.com/surveillance-capitalism/] | yes
[https://markosaric.com/surveillance-capitalism/#replace-google-search-with-duckduckgo]
| yes, if you consider DDG an unethical alternative | site withholds DDG
wrongdoing, and makes a positive claim that DDG has no filter bubble (which is
disputed) | | Frama [https://framasoft.org/en/] | no (and in fact DDG
blacklisted
[https://contact.framasoft.org/wp-content/uploads/newsletters/newsletter10.html]
Framabee) | no | n/a | | PRISM-Break [https://prism-break.org/en/] | yes
[https://prism-break.org/en/projects/duckduckgo/] | yes, by economically
supporting privacy abusing surveillance capitalists (direct adversaries of the
PRISM-Break mission) | site withholds DDG wrongdoing | | PTIO
[https://privacytools.io/] | yes
[https://www.privacytools.io/providers/search-engines/] | yes, financing privacy
abusers works against PTIOâs mission. | site cautions about UKUSA, but withholds
most DDG wrongdoing | | Security Checklist [https://securitycheckli.st/] | yes |
depends on userâs previous tool whether DDG is an improvement | site withholds
DDG wrongdoing and also makes unverifiable* claims | | Surveillance Self-Defense
[https://ssd.eff.org/en] | almost
[https://ssd.eff.org/en/module/how-use-tor-macos] | meh, you decide |
Endorsement is kind of implied by TB advocacy & presentation of default search
engine without caution | | Stallman [https://stallman.org] | no
[https://stallman.org/articles/duckduckgo-censorship.html] | no | page overlooks
most DDG issues, but it was only meant to expose one issue | | Switching
Software [https://switching.software] | yes
[https://switching.software/replace/google-search/] | yes, if you consider DDG
an unethical alternative | site withholds DDG wrongdoing and also makes
unverifiable* claims | | ThinkPrivacy [thinkprivacy.ch] | yes
[https://web.archive.org/web/20200326231847/www.thinkprivacy.ch/search] | yes,
financing privacy abusers works against TPâs mission. | site withholds DDG
wrongdoing and also makes unverifiable* claims | (*) DDG claims they do not
track users, but they cannot prove it. So when a third party like Switching
Software [https://switching.software] or ThinkPrivacy [thinkprivacy.ch] states
DDG does not track you, they are asserting something they canât. They should not
be endorsing DDG in the first place, but if they insist, then they should
instead say something like âDDG claims not to track youâ so as to avoid
deceiving people about the verifiability of the claim. Itâs particularly
interesting to note that ThinkPrivacy gives the highest endorsement to Startpage
[https://www.thinkprivacy.ch/checklist.html], which was bought by US advertising
company âSystem1â. Yet ThinkPrivacy loudly condemns
[https://www.thinkprivacy.ch/cutting-the-wire] for the very same reason. Why?
Dan Arel works for Startpage. This arose out of a scandal where Mr. Arel was
advising the privacytools.io [http://privacytools.io] project at the time PTIO
was considering pulling their endorsement of Startpage. To be fair, DuckDuckGo
has a much more extensive history of undermining privacy both directly and by
proxy through partnerships with privacy abusers than Startpage. ## Harmful
endorsement: Qwant While Qwant has some privacy strengths that make it
substantially more trustworthy and privacy-respecting than DuckDuckGo, it still
has noteworthy issues that undermine privacy: 1. Privacy 1. Tor hostility â Tor
users are sometimes forced to solve a CAPTCHA [https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/31645],
and itâs implemented in a destructive manner. That is, the search query is
collected before Qwant decides to push a CAPTCHA. Since the user has already
invested effort in typing the query, the user is coerced to solve the puzzle in
order to not throw away their effort to that point. Then after successfully
solving the puzzle, the query is wiped out anyway and the user is forced to
retype their query. 1. No proxy feature. Some search engines like Searxes and
Metager give an alternative proxy or cached link that avoids directly connecting
to the site in the results. This is useful for all users but itâs important to
Tor users because many sites block or mistreat Tor users, in which case Tor
users must visit the site indirectly. Qwant neglects to accommodate. 1. Qwantâs
swag store [http://store.qwant.com/] accepts Paypal, who then shares customers
data with 600 companies
[https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2018/03/the_600_compani.html] amid other
abuses [https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/30880]. 1. Qwantâs swag store
[http://store.qwant.com/] says âfollow us on Facebookâ, leading users into mass
surveillance and makes no mention of their Mastodon account
[https://social.privacytools.io/@Qwant]. 1. Microsoft partnership
[https://betterweb.qwant.com/en/how-microsoft-tools-strengthen-qwant/] has been
ongoing. 1. Qwant patronizes Microsoft for its advertising network
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qwant] 1. Qwant claims they no longer use Bing
search results, but this is disputed. (And then they admit
[https://mastodon.social/@Qwant/103692143045274520] to it) 1. Qwant uses
[https://betterweb.qwant.com/en/how-microsoft-tools-strengthen-qwant/] Microsoft
Azure cloud services. 1. Qwantâs swag store [http://store.qwant.com/] sells
apparel made of cotton, which is bad for the environment. 1. Qwant has ties
[https://social.privacytools.io/@Qwant/102945184291956539] to Fight for the
Future Inc [https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/31655], an organization that claims to
fight for net neutrality yet uses CloudFlare themselves. We wonât document all
of Microsoftâs wrongdoing here, but MS has a long history of privacy abuse and
still today they are embroiled in privacy scandals such as financial facial
recognition technology to AnyVision and violating the GDPR. | site | Qwant
endorsement | siteâs position & mission are inconsistent | endorsement
misinforms or withholds pitfalls | |â|â|â|â| | de-Google-ify
[https://markosaric.com/surveillance-capitalism/] | no | no | n/a | | Frama
[https://framasoft.org/en/] | no | no | n/a | | PRISM-Break
[https://prism-break.org/en/] | no | no | n/a | | PTIO
[https://privacytools.io/] | yes
[https://www.privacytools.io/providers/search-engines/] | yes | site withholds
Qwant wrongdoing | | Security Checklist [https://securitycheckli.st/] | no | no
| n/a | | Surveillance Self-Defense [https://ssd.eff.org/en] | no | no | n/a | |
Stallman [https://stallman.org] | no | no | n/a | | Switching Software
[https://switching.software] | yes
[https://switching.software/replace/google-search/] | yes, if you consider Qwant
unethical | site withholds Qwant wrongdoing and also makes unverifiable* claims
| | ThinkPrivacy [thinkprivacy.ch] | no | no | n/a | (*) Qwant claims they do
not track users, but they cannot prove it. So when a third party like Switching
Software [https://switching.software] states Qwant does not track you, they are
asserting something they canât. They should not be endorsing Qwant in the first
place, but if they insist, then they should instead say something like âQwant
claims not to track youâ so as to avoid deceiving ppl about the verifiability of
the claim. OTOH, Qwant would be violating the GDPR if they did track you
contrary to their privacy policy, so perhaps itâs fair enough for Switching
Software to make this assertion (unlike DDG, who is bound only contractually &
theyâve shown to violate it already). Itâs worth considering that sites that
endorse DuckDuckGo and nothing else are actually more harmful than sites that
list other alternatives like Qwant, b/c there is more likeliness that users opt
to use DDG when itâs the only endorsed choice. (part 2: messaging services
[https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/32542]) (part 3: s/w repos
[https://dev.lemmy.ml/post/35452])
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