DuckDuckGo’s traffic surges after PRISM news

[anuseems]

Up until three days ago traffic to the DuckDuckGo search engine website remained relatively stable at about 1.7 million to 1.8 million direct queries per day. This changed on Monday when a new record high of 2.2 million direct queries was recorded, only to be surpassed on Wednesday by 2.3 million direct queries.

The reason? According to DuckDuckGo's traffic page a Bloomberg TV Interview on June 10 in the wake of PRISM. While that certainly played a role, it is more likely that the service has benefited from the fact that major tech companies such as Google or Microsoft have been associated with PRISM, and that at least some Internet users are looking for third party solutions that are not.

A rise by about 500,000 direct queries is big for a search engine like DuckDuckGo, and the past has shown that it can usually retain the traffic level once it has reached it. While it is certainly too early to tell if this will be the case this time as well, it is definitely possible.

As it the possibility that the rise has not stopped yet. The coming days will show if the rise continues, plateaus or even drops again.

2.3 million direct queries may be a new high for the search engine, but it is not that much compared to Google's average searches per day which have been recorded as over 4.7 Billion in 2011.

An increase could give DuckDuckGo more traction and mouth to mouth propaganda, something that it direly needs to increase its exposure on the market as an alternative to Google or Bing.

The search engine respects user privacy and self-determination in a number of ways. It does not record user IP addresses, does not track its users, does not use personalized search results to put users in filter bubbles, and does not clutter the search results with dozens of its own services and advertisement.

@ https://duckduckgo.com/traffic.html

[kn_andre]

duckduckgo.com is a nice Search Engine. I like it because it's https which means little bit extra Security... Its Plain and Uncluttered too ... Thanks @anuseems for this Article ... Do have a nice day and Cheers ..... :) :) :)

[948bennett]

not heard of this search engine before so gonna give it a go, thanks

[CODYQX4]

How anonymous is this when you use the direct search (like Google image search, Wikipedia, etc...)?

[Avitar]

Private search engine? Sure I'll give it a try... might be exactly what I need.

[avmad]

It's been my only engine for quite a while now.

[Ambrocious]

I love DuckDuckGo, it has unique search results that are often right on target. It's not Google but at least it respects our privacy and overall does a good job.

[Ambrocious]

It's been my only engine for quite a while now.

You should look up Startpage.com too.

[Ambrocious]

It's been my only engine for quite a while now.

You should look up Startpage.com too.

<-------------- ENHANCED BY GOOGLE ????

From StartPage and WHY it is safe:

No PRISM. No Surveillance. No Government Back Doors. You Have our Word on it. Giant US government Internet spying scandal revealed

The Washington Post and The Guardian have revealed a US government mass Internet surveillance program code-named "PRISM". They report that the NSA and the FBI have been tapping directly into the servers of nine US service providers, including Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Apple, Yahoo, YouTube, AOL and Skype, and began this surveillance program at least seven years ago. (clarifying slides)

These revelations are shaking up an international debate.

StartPage has always been very outspoken when it comes to protecting people's privacy and civil liberties. So it won't surprise you that we are a strong opponent of overreaching, unaccountable spy programs like PRISM. In the past, even government surveillance programs that were begun with good intentions have become tools for abuse, for example tracking civil rights and anti-war protesters.

Programs like PRISM undermine our Privacy, disrupt faith in governments, and are a danger to the free Internet.

StartPage and its sister search engine Ixquick have in their 14-year history never provided a single byte of user data to the US government, or any other government or agency. Not under PRISM, nor under any other program in the US, nor under any program anywhere in the world. We are not like Yahoo, Facebook, Google, Apple, Skype, or the other US companies who got caught up in the web of PRISM surveillance.

Here's how we are different:

• StartPage does not store any user data. We make this perfectly clear to everyone, including any governmental agencies. We do not record the IP addresses of our users and we don't use tracking cookies, so there is literally no data about you on our servers to access. Since we don't even know who our customers are, we can't share anything with Big Brother. In fact, we've never gotten even a single request from a governmental authority to supply user data in the fourteen years we've been in business.
• StartPage uses encryption (HTTPS) by default. Encryption prevents snooping. Your searches are encrypted, so others can't "tap" the Internet connection to snoop what you're searching for. This combination of not storing data together with using strong encryption for the connections is key in protecting your Privacy.
• Our company is based in The Netherlands, Europe. US jurisdiction does not apply to us, at least not directly. 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 refer to our first point; we don't even have any user data to give. We will never cooperate with voluntary spying programs like PRISM.
• StartPage cannot be forced to start spying. Given the strong protection of the Right to Privacy in Europe , European governments cannot just start forcing service providers like us to implement a blanket spying program on their users. And if that ever changed, we would fight this to the end.

Privacy. It's not just our policy, it's our business.

Read the Privacy Policy from StartPage, a branch search engine by ixquick

It gathers search results from Google, you never have any direct connection to Google and NONE of your information is shared, stored, logged, PERIOD. I wondered how long it would take for someone to poke at the whole "Enhanced by Google" thing without looking deeper.

[avmad]

I've tried them all. I prefer the duck.

[danieltex]

The problem I have is that nearly all the people who think that Prism is the extent of the intrusion into data on the www. are deluding themselves. The US government has made sure that it has unfettered access to everything it likes on the internet and has done for some time. Considering the huge part GCHQ plays in this shared tech the UK government too.

The good news is that we are all now becoming aware just how much they do, and how much our privacy of data is important.

The guys at startpage make me laugh -" we've never gotten even a single request from a governmental authority to supply user data in the fourteen years we've been in business." Yes well when you can just look and see what you want without asking or tipping your hand you don't need to do you?

They are way ahead of the curve when it comes to encryption technology - believe me when I say that every commercially available encryption system has been hacked, broken and solved and that they are tapped into stuff at extremely low levels and directly into hardware (BT take note regarding the Hauwei/ chinese government!). VPN's will not protect you- they pass through their hardware after all.

If the signal or data passes through any externally owned comm system, they will have it.

We know this because the tech IS ALLOWED to be used. Years ago software sellers such as microsoft were not allowed to sell 128bit encryption software to "foreign" powers, then all of a sudden its OK. Why? because it had been totally cracked and the US could listen in. The first thing you want is for you enemies(and friends of course!) to use something that they think is secure when you can listen in at will. Think about the research into quantum computing - ask yourself why its all very quiet on that front these days and why 10 years ago even there was money being pumped into it and now its all stopped.Why do you think that the military are all over laser comms, frequency hopping microwave andprefer hardwire only comms systems.

Quantum entangled pairs will soon be the only secure means of communicating - and don't think they don't already have that past development stage too!

Ask yourself why anyone who works on any really useful stuff that could change the game is suddenly employed by the government or gets their grants cut.

Of course it's far easier to pass laws and demand backdoor access in the name of anti terrorism. As far as I am aware terrorists don't on the whole have a lot of use for download services past what anyone else does, despite what FACT and the movie industry will try to tell you. If they want to organise and pass messages its well known that anyone serious about it ( just like spies etc.)can use one time pads, personal coding systems and pre arranged innocent messages coding systems that just do not need to be encrypted even and are untraceable.

Your data is their power. :huh: