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What is the best privacy focused search engine?
(sh.itjust.works)
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this post was submitted on 07 Oct 2023
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Privacy
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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.
Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.
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- Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
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- If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
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Disclaimer: Kagi user here.
Searches are not pay-per-use anymore. But you still have to be logged in to search. The premise is, that they don't store your searches. It is not their business model. You are the paying customer, not the ad firms. This is, ultimately, not verifiable. It comes down to some sort of trust. And I do trust in them. The developers are actually great guys, there is a discord where they answer immediately, and a discourse forum where you can submit bugs/features, etc.
They take a strong stance on freedom. They refused to implement a suicide prevention message, as they felt, that it wasbnot the job of the search engine to patronize the user.
There is such a thing as a 'session link'. You can get it from you account. With this, I don't think cookies are necesary. But the link expires so you have to do it probably every few days anew.
The thing is: I want to aupport them. They have cool features (up/downranking websites, GPT-4 access over their proxy, etc.) Is it better than self-hosting: no. But I don't wanna self-host. And search is something that costs. So any service that does not live off donations or some sort of payment, is suspicious.
I hope I explained some of my reasons. Please debunk me and make me cancel my subscription there if I am in the wrong. Im not a shill and actually interested in your concerns :)
Hrmmmm...not sure if the username checks out.
It's probably a leading contender for one of the "best for privacy", especially with their business model and even a warrant canary on their legal page. Their Privacy Policy also does a lot to explain things.
It is a slightly different claim to being a privacy first or privacy focused search engine. Privacy is more of a close 2nd priority then a 1st and foremost priority. The difference is small but real. For example, Kagi is incorporated in the USA and has to comply with USA laws. Not a country known for its outstanding track record.
How do you access the GPT4 feature?
I think by kagi.com/fastgpt
Thanks!
GPT-4 is for Ultimate users ($25/month). The "weaker" models like GPT-3.5 will be rolled out for Pro users($10/month) in the next few weeks.
PS: FastGPT+ Summarizer exist as well, but this was not what I was talking about. Those are both somewhat limited AI tools, the GPT thing is the full blown access
Got it - thanks for the explanation!
This has so many red flags to it.
Logged in search with them knowing your payment info is significantly more privacy invasive then logged out Google search.
Their business model is "trust me bro". Which if you take marketing at face value then Google must be taking your privacy seriously, right?
They supposedly take a stance on freedom and transparency... Yet they use Discord lol.
The refusal of a suicide prevention mention is just straight up fucked up. It doesn't change results, and that extra small message that costs them nothing and could save a life. There's literally no downside and only upsides.
You can pay via Crypto/bank transfer and probably with cash soon.
The Discord thing is a valid point.
I don't agree on the trust part with you. EVERY SOFTWARE we use boils down to trust. Because let's be honest, we all don't read the source code. (most of the time)
And finally there are downsides to such messages: Where do they stop? If someone searches for how to suicide, they should be getting relevant information for their query. Overall, I thought that if you find all the aforementioned things bad, you might like this one. From a liberal perspective, this is great.