More reasoning to use Startpage over Google
http://techcrunch.com/2012/11/25/google-search-history-murder-evidence/
In no way, shape, or form am I condoning the acts in this news story, but I found it interesting in how Google Search results may sway decisions in a court case. This story of course talks about browser history and if the government needed to, could prove those results linked to the IP address.
This is why search engines like Startpage with the POST option (not GET) under an HTTPS connection are important to use for private search. Your browser history doesn't have the search query in the URL and Startpage does not log your results. I guess if you are extra worried, there is always Tor on top of Startpage.
Of course this information well known to tech saavy users, not some redneck b*tch who uses Google in how to kill her kid.
There's some very good reasons to be concerned about internet privacy, I think. I've heard that old saw of 'if you're obeying the law you've got nothing to hide' type of thing before, but of course there's far more to it than that.
As an atheist and feminist there are already a few countries I'd be hesitant to enter. I know one atheist who is unable to return to his home country due to blogging about atheism. LGBT folk face issues in many countries.
And since when is simply searching for information evidence? Do they know WHY you're searching? You want information on how to talk about drugs with your kids - is that 'evidence' that you were trying to get drugs, when they pull you up at the airport and someone has tampered with your baggage?
I was reading about TOR but I gather it's not quite ironclad.
In the article was written that the suspect made searches like "22 ways to kill a man with bare hands" and someone else made searcher "foolproof suffocation".
Imagine someone saying to him/her that he knows 22 ways to kill you bare handed or how to suffocate you without leaving any evidence of that. Now the suspect is scared and want to know more can the threats be true. He/she makes searches and later those searches are used as evidence for murder.
Interesting article. This is scary road. For example, someone having access to your computer makes that kind of searches and kill your wife. Your computer is examined and you are charged of murder.
This Google and Facebook, haha, it is funny to think that Google and Facebook can know more of you than your spouse. Actually, Google and Facebook can know more of you than anyone else.
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Ouch!
So what's the best search engine for freedom then?
Is it Startpage? ...Or perhaps YaCy? DuckDuckGo? Ixquick?
I don't believe the EFF or FSF has promoted a particular one. I may be wrong, but I think the FSFE likes YaCy.
I'd appreciate suggestions please. Thank you.
I don't think the FSF would promote any particular search engine because they are services, outside of a user's control. But they all work fine with free software.
RMS says he sometimes uses DuckDuckGo, as well as other search engines. [1]
I think DuckDuckGo and DuckDuckHack is good, because they make some source code available. I have tried to access YaCy a few times but it either timed out or the results weren't that good.
When DuckDuckGo doesn't work (it seems to not like quotes in a search sometimes) I use StartPage. Although I used someone else's computer and I think they might use Google Ads (I have JS disabled so I don't see them, but they might have changed by now).
I don't object to using other search engines, but I generally don't use them either. As long as they work okay without JavaScript and cookies.
By default, DuckDuckGo uses Bing's search engine so results aren't as good as using Startpage or Google. What is nice about DDG are the bangs it offers (https://duckduckgo.com/bang.html) and if you don't like the default DDG results, you can just add a !s to the end and hit enter in the search box to switch over to Startpage.
It is a shame there are not a whole lot of popular free software search engines out there. I'm talking about full Affero GPLv3 with the source code available and searches ALWAYS under HTTPS.