Alternative Search Engines instead of Google

Back in the day, I was one of the first people to start using Google as a search engine. I liked it’s clean interface, and simplicity.

Of course, over the years, other people also found this to be the preferential search engine. Unfortunately, Google became big, powerful and yes, evil. They siphon up your personal information with zero regard to fourth amendment protections. They sell the information to the highest bidder, and give it away for free if the person is part of a government agency.

Unfortunately, people like myself VALUE privacy. And that means that I no longer can use Google.

Here is a selection of various search engine alternatives to Google. It is not a complete list. As there are thousands of alternatives. These are some the best ones that I have found.

You might discover, as I have, that they have BETTER and more comprehensive results than Google. You just need to understand that they work differently than Google. So you must query your searches differently…

You see, Google only provides results to you that they feel should be presented to you.

This is problematic. Because they only show you the possible results that you qualify for. The qualification rules are kept secret, and are a closely held secret at that. They, like many of their politically liberal breathren, consider themselves as your parents and have the role of censoring your search results for (what they consider to be) your own good.

With all this being said, let’s look at the top candidate…

Duck Duck Go

Let’s start with the fist step is divorcing yourself from Google. Use Duckduckgo. If you go duck, you will never go back.

It is clean and operates much like Google does. The only difference is that it is private. Yes, you can think of it as the Google that should have been. While Google is “evil Spock” (a fine Star Trek reference), Duckduckgo would be the “good Spock”.

Duckduckgo is a search engine that does not track or personalize your searches and results.

For those of you who are unaware, the “personalization” of search results is the permitted censorship of search results. Don’t go down that dark and scary road.

It is my humble opinion that if you like Google, then you will love Duckduckgo. They offer the same kind of service, only faster, better, quicker and with far more privacy.

If you want to make the world a better place, then stop using Google and start using search engines that respect your privacy.

Duckduckgo is a great search engine that values privacy over everything else. They operate much like Google only they respect your fourth amendment rights.

It should be obvious that Google is working closely with the United States government in the collection of your personal data, as well as the manipulation and censorship of data to control your thoughts. After all, look at all the trips Google had with Barrack Obama. They certainly weren’t swapping golf stories. 

• Google’s Remarkably Close Relationship With the Obama Presidency
• Meet Google’s Deep State Policy Manipulator 
• Google workers met had 427 meetings at White House
• Google Makes Most of Close Ties to White House – WSJ 

Quack!

Unfortunately, for me, Duckduckgo is banned in China. major bummer! So, personally I am forced to use alternative search engines. Which brings me to…

Search Encrypt

Like DuckDuckGo, Search Encrypt is a privacy-based search engine. It includes a general search function, as well as image and video search. This is a search engine that was design with privacy in mind. They believe that your likes, thoughts and search history should be just as private as the color of your underwear.

I agree.

They have a very clean interface, much like Google, except that everything is private and kept secret. They can do most of what you need, and all of what I (personally) use the search engine for.

Search Encrypt should be a preferred search engine for anyone wishing to maintain their privacy in a world where everyone lies and makes false promises. I use it in China without a problem.

I can see this search engine growing and becoming more popular over the years.  Time will only tell, if they will maintain their role as the guaranteerer of privacy, or if they will sell out to the highest bidder…

Those tech “giants” in California tend to make empty promises and will sell you out in a heartbeat. Let’s not forget the promises that Yahoo! made when it acquired Tumblr, and then what happened when Verizon took over and crapped on the policies that reflected creative expression  in 17DEC18. Never forget the broken promises, the lies, and the sell-out for huge monetary gain.

That’s About It!

Sorry, but that’s about it for privacy based Internet Searches that I (personally) would feel comfortable using. The problem is that most other search engines are either (somehow) tied to Google (and the American NSA spying apparatus), or tied to one or another government. Now, there is good and bad with this revelation.

• By splitting up searches between different government agencies and promoted search engines you can effectively DILUTE the content of search history that any one government has on you.
• By using different search engines the SEO attributes are different; thus resulting in different search results.

With that being said, let’s look at some more or less QUESTIONABLE search alternatives out there. Some are promoted as “big on privacy”, others are simply large but tied to a non-American government.

Keep in mind, these search engines must be used with caution and consideration…

StartPage

We will start with a well promoted search alternative. You can find this quite easily on Bing and Google as the “private” alternative to internet searches. Now, back in the day, Startpage was the world’s most private search engine. It was, because no one else gave a rat’s ass about privacy.

You see, StartPage was the first search engine to allow users to search privately. None of your details are recorded and no cookies are used, unless you allow it to remember your preferences. It also provides a proxy for those who want to not just search, but browse the internet with full privacy.

Instead of being a full alternative to Google, it combines Google Search results with user privacy. So, when you use StartPage, you’ll get the same Google Search Engine results. The only difference is that your privacy/information isn’t submitted. Google only sees StartPage, not the StartPage user. This enhancement is one of the reasons why StartPage results are so useful. 

In short, StartPage Search Engine is the most appropriate private search engine for those who love Google results but can’t make a compromise with privacy.

The user should beware. Many companies that suck up your personal information and browsing habits ALSO promote Startpage. You have to wonder why.

I mean, why does Facebook and Google offer links to “their versions” of Startpage? It makes me pause and think.

• Facebook version of Startpage
• Google version of Startpage
  

Do you believe that a Facebook version of Startpage would maintain your privacy? What about a Google version of Startpage? I don’t. In fact, even if they were sincere in wanting to secure your privacy, I can’t help but think of them polluting the entire effort.

MetaGer

How about going to a different country? How about Germany? Now, I have to make a full disclosure that I personally love Germany. I think the German people are awesome. I love the food. I also like the “restaurant chain style” bordellos. Not to mention it is a beautiful land with an awesome history.

They also, and most importantly, respect privacy.

MetaGer is German-based meta-search engine, developed on 24 small scale web crawlers. It focuses on user’s privacy and makes searches untraceable by leaving no footprint behind. Also, it integrates a proxy server so that users can open any link anonymously from the search results while keeping their IP address hidden from the destination server. This eliminates the chances of advertisers to target you for ads.

The results are obtained from 50 different search engines. Before presenting final results of the query, they are filtered, compiled and sorted.

If you have optimized your website for search by Google, and Bing and the other more prominent American websites, you might be disappointed. This search engine utilizes a completely different criteria to search with, and the results reflect it.

However, the really great news is that you will find many websites that Google, and Bing cannot find.

And now the bad news. It might be publicly private, but who actually knows what the German government might have on the browsing habits of those whom use this search engine…Hum?

Yandex

Now, we go to Russia!

Yes. Russia, of all places. We need to put on our commie waders and step out of the American deep-state swamp and enter another deep-state swamp. Only this time it is a cold one covered in icy slush; the Mother Russian land of internet.

Yandex is the largest search engine in Russia with nearly 65% Russian market share. According the Comscore, it is the fourth largest search engine in the world with over 150 million searches per day as of 2012.

Yandex features a parallel search that shows results from main web index as well as specialized information resources, including blogs, news, image and video webpages, and eCommerce sites. In addition, the search engine provides supplementary information (like sports results), and contains spell checkers, autocomplete functionality and antivirus that detects malicious content on webpages.

Unlike the other search engines, this one is NOT optimized for privacy.  So, that tells me that you can pretty much expect the Russian government knows who you are and are tracking your internet history for their own purposes. What ever they might be.

Hum… is there a cute large-chested blond-haired Russian femme fatal in my future? I wonder?

Now, the beauty in using this search engine is that the organizations that want your personal information don’t really want your data. After all, it’s going to be pretty hard to target you for Russian Viagra in Saint Petersburgh when you are living in Sunnyside, California. And, it will be unlikely for you to read the Cyrillic characters in their advertisements in the first place.

Personally, I think that there is far more harm in the NSA having your personal information than any Russian secret police force, even if it’s a modern version of the KGB.

The reasoning is simple. If the United States government; federal, state, local or agency want’s to arrest you, they will need to make a case out of how evil you are. Then they will compile the reasoning into the most damning case, and convince you to agree to lesser charges via plea bargain. Often they will use your computer habits to justify their narrative.

However, in Russia, and China, they won’t do this. If they want to arrest you, they will simply do so. Period. No justification and song and dance of survival is necessary.

Bing Search

OK. Now, back to America. We all know that Google has rivals…Microsoft.

Bing is Microsoft’s attempt at unseating Google, and arguably the second-most-popular search engine today. Bing used to be MSN search until it was updated in summer of 2009. They should NEVER be considered a Search Engine that honors individual privacy. However, they are placed here in this list for those members of the European Union, who get to have privacy in the their searches that Americans are denied.

Touted as a decision engine, Bing tries to support your researching by offering suggestions in the leftmost column, while also giving you various search options across the top of the screen. Things like ‘wiki’ suggestions, ‘visual search’, and ‘related searches’ might be very useful to you. Bing is not dethroning Google in the near future, no, but it is definitely worth trying. 

Like Google, however, they will most certainly block certain websites, and avoid others at the request of the United States government. From “Uncle Sam’s” point of view, you go after the “low handing fruit” that the vast bulk of Americans use. Then ridicule the outliers as “misfits”, “deplorables”, and “Nazi’s”.

As far as privacy is concerned, Bing will alter the behavior of the Search Engine if you live in the EU.

All you need to do is [1] Go here and fill out the application form, [2] wait for a response. Then, [3] trusting that they will obey your request, you are free to use Bing.

"Please provide any other relevant information describing your privacy interest in having this information blocked in response to searches on the name specified above and why you believe your privacy interest outweighs the public’s interest in free expression and the free availability of information."

That’s right, boy’s and girl’s, you need to petition Bing and explain why you want to have privacy. That should tell you all you need to know about how these software companies think of you and your families.

Youdao

Now to China. Privacy…I highly doubt it. 

Youdao is a search engine in China released by the company NetEase. It allows users to easily search for images, web pages, music, news, blogs, and even Chinese to English entries in the dictionary, and several others. In 2012, Hui-hui shopping assistant was established, serving as a tool that will allow users to compare items and prices online.

I would not say that they would honor a person’s right to privacy. However, like the Russian search engine, the companies that seem to want to collect user information would find most Americans boring and useless.

Yippy Search

Some deep searches are worth the risk to privacy. When that comes in play, consider Yippy!

Yippy is a Deep Web search engine that searches other search engines for you. Unlike the regular Web, which is indexed by robot spider programs, Deep Web pages are usually harder to locate by conventional search.

That’s where Yippy becomes very useful. If you are searching for obscure hobby interest blogs, obscure government information, tough-to-find obscure news, academic research and otherwise-obscure content, then Yippy is your tool. 

Visit Yippy Search

There isn’t any guarantee that your privacy would be maintained, however, this search engine will take you places that other Search Engines (think Google and Bing) would hide from you.

Yahoo! Search

Yahoo! is several things: it is a search engine, a news aggregator, a shopping center, an emailbox, a travel directory, a horoscope and games center, and more.

This ‘web portal’ breadth of choice makes this a very helpful site for Internet beginners. Searching the Web should also be about discovery and exploration, and Yahoo! delivers that in wholesale quantities.

Yahoo! also won’t protect your privacy like some of the other search engines mentioned herein. However, they won’t pre-censor to “protect” you either.

On Google, for instance, I had to wade through pages and pages of stuff about how the John Titor Time-traveler was a hoax, with no pages on the actual text of his BBS narrative. Yet, Yahoo! took me right there in a nano-second. Straight the “meat”, with no roadblocks of propagandized articles.

The Internet Archive Search

The Internet Archive is a favorite destination for longtime Web lovers. The Archive has been taking snapshots of the entire World Wide Web for years now, allowing you and me to travel back in time to see what a web page looked like in 1999, or what the news was like around Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

You won’t visit the Archive daily, like you would Google or Yahoo or Bing, but when you do have need to travel back in time, use this search site.

Visit The Internet Archive

DeepWebTech

With DeepWebTech you can choose between five search engines. If one doesn’t work for you, you can always count on the other to help you find what you need. Just like Chrome, DeepWebTech also counts with browser plugins for you to use if you are searching for something in particular.

With this deep web search engine, you can find information on a subject such as medicine, science, and business. If Google is not giving you what you are looking for, you can count on these deep web search engines getting the job done.

While the privacy is suspect with all these search engines, I do not think that occasional use of such Deep Web trawlers are anything to be overly concerned about. Use a VPN and TOR, if you are concerned.

Other Search Engines….

Here are some other search engines that are worthy of a spin. Like before, they won’t really guard your privacy. However, they might scatter all your searches in a series of disjointed data centers.

Ask.com

Launched in 1996, Ask.com is a question answering-focused web search engine. Despite its age, Ask is still very active. They have coupled their search-system with a robust questions and answer system with billions of online content.

As of 2014, the website had 180 million global users per month (with a larger user base in the US), and to date, its mobile app has been downloaded over 40 million times. They acquired a social networking site, Ask.fm, where people can ask questions with the option of anonymity. ASKfm handles around 20,000 questions every minute.

Baidu

Baidu is the most popular search engine in China. This is definitely the most useful engine if you want to improve your SEO’s, but it functions very differently from Google.

The main differences compared to Google come down to how the sites operate. While on the surface they may look similar, different focuses and older systems mean that while Baidu’s technology is better at processing Chinese, they still place a high emphasis on Meta tags, meaning users are open to scams.

One key difference that should be noted is that Baidu is a completely Chinese website, and there are very few non-Chinese sites that come up. While this is difficult for those who are trying to break into the market, it is one of the reasons why it has such a large user base.

QiHoo 360

This is another very important search engine in the Chinese market. In 2016 they had around 29%  (according to SEOagencychina.com) of the market share, however, in 2017 they seem to have around 10% of the market. This is a significant drop and can be accounted for by Baidu’s massive increase.

QiHoo 360’s flagship search engine is actually called Haosou, so it is important that while the company is called QiHoo 360, the search engine has a different name.

Haosou offers a wide range of services including news, websites, images, Q&A, videos, images and music, as well other services. As you can tell it runs a very similar service to Baidu.

Other Search Engines

There are other search engines that you can use. However, you do need to be careful. Many (not all, but many, many) work with Google. (Snarl!) They offer (so called) “anonymous searching” but rely on Google as the back-end. I, for one, do not trust them. When I search, I don’t want to have anything to do with Google. No matter what anyone else says.

Gibru

Gibru claims to provide Uncensored, Anonymous Search Engine experience — both in the web version and with the official Mozilla Firefox toolbar. This search engine is noted for the 128-bit secure encryption, the promise of data safety and optimal privacy.

Lukol

Lukol is an easy-to-use private search engine. It does neither track your information nor store your IP. It has no tie-up with Governments or security agencies to share your data. In short, you don’t have to worry about your search indexes getting exposed.

Qrobe.it

Qrobe.it is another alternative private search engine to rely upon. The interface is way too simple, and you’ll be able to search for Images and Web content. You also get some Settings option and Advanced Search

Some Alternative Search Engines…

Ah, it is just impossible to do anything privately today. Everyone wants a piece of your action. Sigh.

Naver

Naver isn’t actually an “alternate” search engine at all. In fact, Naver is number one in South Koreawhere Google has a very small share. It used to be powered by Yahoo’s Overture system, but following the Yahoo-Microsoft alliance, the engine decided to build and launch its own keyword advertising system, so Naver has now become a leading search engine with its own advertising system. If you’re targeting Korea, put this one first.

Seznam

In the Czech Republic, Seznam has been in the lead for a long time and still just about competes with Google there. However, Google is rapidly creeping up and knocking at its door. For now, continue considering Seznam as essential in the Czech Republic. Over the border in the the Czech Republic’s sibling state Slovakia (they were once one nation and known as Czechosolvakia), Google has already taken over as a strong lead in first place.

Eniro

Eniro is an interesting example of a search engine in Sweden and for a variety of reasons. Eniro is the orignial publisher of Sweden’s Yellow Pages and, as a result, Eniro still has significant brand traction in the country. However, more recently, Eniro has partnered with Google for some aspects of search and for advertising.

What’s interesting though is that Eniro has developed its own pay per click advertising system and then backfills with Google ads which is a model I think we can expect to see emerge more widely. You don’t have to take much more share of advertising revenues, to justify building such a system and amortizing its costs over a few years.

Onet.pl

Well, I will say this about the Poles. They are honest about collecting  your data and selling it to others for their own purposes…

Before you click "Go to site" or close this window, please read this information. 

We ask for your voluntary consent to the processing of your personal data by our business partners and provide information about the so-called 
cookies and about the processing of your personal data by us. 
By clicking "Go to site" or closing the window by clicking the X icon, you agree to the following. You can also refuse consent or limit its scope.

A Polish portal with a strong following, Onet.pl has a slightly different version of the Eniro approach. Here, its search coming almost entirely from Google. It relies on on its advertising for revenue generation.

If you want to agree to the processing of your personal data by Trusted Partners of RAS Polska Group, which you share in the history of browsing websites and web applications and location data generated by your device for marketing purposes (including automated analysis of your activity on websites and applications to determine Your potential interests for adapting the advertisement and offer), including placing web tags (cookies, etc.) on your devices and reading such tags, click "Go to website" or close this window.

Orange

The telecoms companies over the years have, in general, gained a larger slice of “eyeballs” and have often overtaken the former search engines for audience. In France, for instance, Orange has a very strong portal which carries a search function. That search function is powered by Voila.fr — probably the number one ,original French search engine. It’s not Google…Hurrah!

However, the pay per click advertising on Orange.fr comes straight from Google, so this is an example of the opposite business model to those above.

Spiegel.de

Another trend of the moment is of newly prominent search sites that are news portals, generally the online mirrors of offline mega-brands. Der Spiegel (The Mirror) has been the leading and best respected German news magazine since its launch in 1947. Its move to online guaranteed a strong audience and an opportunity for both search and news advertisers.

It has a fascinating approach to search. Here, all searches query the Spiegel itself. Other issues are broken down by related organizations. For instance,  plus manager-magazin.de for management issues, merian.de for travel and Wikipedia, clearly giving it a focus on responding to informational queries.

Spiegel doesn’t yet have a keyword-specific search facility not yet having discovered the opportunity, but it does enable you to build your own banner ads directly online and is just one step away from a very influential keyword search facility. Watch this space!

It’s very interesting, and might one-day be the future of searching the internet. However, an alternative to Google, it is not.

Alibaba.com

It is a search engine and it’s not. It is a Yellow Pages and it’s not. Strongest in China and India, Alibaba is difficult to describe apart from saying that in size, it dwarfs some of the better known search engines.

Some describe Alibaba.com as a dating site matchmaking manufacturers and their various types of distributors, which is actually pretty fair. And it has its own keyword matching advertising facility as well.

Personally, I use Alibaba quite a bit. If you want something. You buy in Bulk. Why spend $400 for ten Viagra pills, when I can buy the raw material for 100,000 pills for half that amount?

Conclusions

One cannot utilize the Internet without a Search Engine. Today, many programs and most of our communication is through the Internet. Our portal and the ways of accessing this Internet is through Search Engines. A person who controls your access; controls your life.

Don’t allow them this ability.

Update 27JUL20

Mojeek.com: 

One of the last independent search engines. Mojeek is based out of the UK, and indexes websites on its own (just past 3 billion last month). It advertises no bias in its search results and it lives up to this claim. I searched for “vaccine danger” and was impressed with the variety and accuracy of the sites listed—mostly anti-vaccine sites, as expected, as opposed to Google which heavily filters it to only pro-vaccine apologia sites. There isn’t even an option for filtering the content for typical “family safe search.” Other than that it is a bare-bones search engine with a tab for web, news and images. The have a robust privacy policy, but very little independent reviews of this site, and I can’t tell how they get revenue. 

Gigablast.com: 

An independent search engine using open-sourced code, Gigablast gathers its own results from independent web-crawling (it has indexed over a billion websites). In this it fights an uphill battle against the big players who refuse to give its bots equal treatment to information. So far I have found its search results fair and unbiased, but there is a little more “clutter” in the results than I am used to from the big search engines, but this reflects its honesty: it is a small, organic search engine. The only source of income is a link for donations (unfortunately through Paypal). Their blog reveals many of the underhanded ways that Google manipulates the information marketplace. They don’t have the privacy features touted by other search sites, except to say that they don’t sell any personal information. 

Private.sh: 

Fortunately another privacy-oriented group built a smooth interface based on the Gigablast independent search results and adds the highest possible privacy. Not only does it strip away any IP information, but it encrypts any search terms you enter within your own browser before it traverses the internet to their website, where it is decrypted, sent to Gigablast, and the results encrypted before sending back to your computer. This effort effectively shields both your query and the results you see from any spying or eavesdropping attempts along the way. Additionally, no personal information is stored and cannot be subpoenaed. All of this is done seamlessly.

Take Aways

• Selection of Search Engines are important for free and unlimited access to information.
• There are many search engines to select from.
• This post includes English search engines that have various degrees of privacy.
• The first step in taking control over your fourth amendment protections is to STOP using Google and use a private and secure search engine.
  

Posts Regarding Life and Contentment

Here are some other similar posts on this venue. If you enjoyed this post, you might like these posts as well. These posts tend to discuss growing up in America. Often, I like to compare my life in America with the society within communist China. As there are some really stark differences between the two.

More Posts about Life

I have broken apart some other posts. They can best be classified about ones actions as they contribute to happiness and life. They are a little different, in subtle ways.

Stories that Inspired Me

Here are reprints in full text of stories that inspired me, but that are nearly impossible to find in China. I place them here as sort of a personal library that I can use for inspiration. The reader is welcome to come and enjoy a read or two as well.

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