Internet search engine DuckDuckGo launched in 2008 with just “a few servers in a dusty basement”. Its modus operandi since day one has been to place an emphasis on protecting users’ privacy, thereby avoiding the practice of spamming them with personalised search results and ads. Such is its commitment to anonymity that it is unable to accurately gauge its current number of users, because it doesn’t track or collect details about them. Despite this quantification quandary, market intelligence estimates place this figure northbound of 50 million.
DuckDuckGo: a gutsy competitor to Google
Despite launching a decade after Google and being dwarfed by the tech giant’s market share (Google accounts for an estimated 91% of all online searches), DuckDuckGo refuses to be cowed by its main competitor. It regularly takes public pot-shots at Google in its advertising, portraying it as an unwanted and even creepy presence constantly lurking in the background.
Where DuckDuckGo can crunch the data, the numbers are impressive. It is currently registering three billion monthly searches and six million monthly downloads, and it employs more than 180 staff. While search engine supremacy unquestionably belongs to Google (and a few other large players such as Yahoo, Bing, Baidu and Yandex), DuckDuckGo has certainly bloodied a few noses, and in most search engine rankings it has crept into the top 10. This growth journey hasn’t gone unnoticed by technology heavy-hitters, with names such as WhatsApp founder Brian Acton and world wide web creator Tim Berners-Lee mentioned in dispatches among the $100 million of secondary investment it won in 2020.
The appeal of private search engines
There is a growing sense of unease among internet users about some of the ways Google goes about its business. It’s not just treasury departments who have had their noses put out of joint, although the fact ‘Google tax’ has its own Wikipedia page is telling on that front. There is also the emergence of so-called ‘dark patterns’ in Google’s user interfaces, where it uses intentionally deceptive controls and layouts to fool people into providing their real-time whereabouts for targeted advertising. Even the most cursory research into Google’s practices uncovers a wealth of controversies, from the caching vs copyright conundrum to the ever-blurring line between privacy, influence and security.
While Google’s Incognito Mode enables users to keep their browsing private from others who use their device, contrary to popular belief it does not block tracking: as you browse in Incognito Mode, search engines are still saving your searches and tracking your activity across the web. Conversely, DuckDuckGo enables users to browse completely anonymously – and if the right apps and extensions are used in tandem, you can also maintain privacy on subsequent pages. With this in mind, it’s easy to see why people who want to avoid being tracked online are turning to private search engines.
The future of search engine privacy
In future, the battle for search engine users won’t solely be driven by today’s main protagonists. Most Google users know that it tracks their online activity, but accept it as a reasonable price to pay for convenience. However, as some of the more nefarious tactics used by the mega-corporation come to light, there is an opportunity for challengers such as DuckDuckGo to offer an alternative solution with the advantage of increased privacy.
Apple’s launch of its App Tracking Transparency feature in April 2021 also helped raise public awareness of the tracking issue, while highlighting how the level of tracking you are subject to depends not only on what search engine you are using, but from what device, where and when.
So what next for DuckDuckGo? A big push centres around its email protection tool, which acts as a third-party filter to give users more privacy without having to get a new inbox. The beta is now open for anyone to try, but the waiting list hints at the tool’s potential popularity. For many personal account users, the junk email respite afforded by the implementation of GDPR was short-lived, so anything that reduces the amount of spamming and tracking is likely to be in demand.
What DuckDuckGo’s future success depends on is people shaking off their inertia and taking their privacy into their own hands. As DuckDuckGo shrewdly observes: “Privacy sceptics have dominated the discussion about online privacy for too long. Sure people care about privacy, but they’ll never do anything about it. It’s time to lay this bad take to rest.”
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Digitalis
We firmly believe that the internet should be available and accessible to anyone, and are committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of circumstance and ability.
To fulfill this, we aim to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. These guidelines explain how to make web content accessible to people with a wide array of disabilities. Complying with those guidelines helps us ensure that the website is accessible to all people: blind people, people with motor impairments, visual impairment, cognitive disabilities, and more.
This website utilizes various technologies that are meant to make it as accessible as possible at all times. We utilize an accessibility interface that allows persons with specific disabilities to adjust the website’s UI (user interface) and design it to their personal needs.
Additionally, the website utilizes an AI-based application that runs in the background and optimizes its accessibility level constantly. This application remediates the website’s HTML, adapts Its functionality and behavior for screen-readers used by the blind users, and for keyboard functions used by individuals with motor impairments.
If you’ve found a malfunction or have ideas for improvement, we’ll be happy to hear from you. You can reach out to the website’s operators by using the following email webrequests@digitalis.com
Our website implements the ARIA attributes (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) technique, alongside various different behavioral changes, to ensure blind users visiting with screen-readers are able to read, comprehend, and enjoy the website’s functions. As soon as a user with a screen-reader enters your site, they immediately receive a prompt to enter the Screen-Reader Profile so they can browse and operate your site effectively. Here’s how our website covers some of the most important screen-reader requirements, alongside console screenshots of code examples:
Screen-reader optimization: we run a background process that learns the website’s components from top to bottom, to ensure ongoing compliance even when updating the website. In this process, we provide screen-readers with meaningful data using the ARIA set of attributes. For example, we provide accurate form labels; descriptions for actionable icons (social media icons, search icons, cart icons, etc.); validation guidance for form inputs; element roles such as buttons, menus, modal dialogues (popups), and others. Additionally, the background process scans all of the website’s images and provides an accurate and meaningful image-object-recognition-based description as an ALT (alternate text) tag for images that are not described. It will also extract texts that are embedded within the image, using an OCR (optical character recognition) technology. To turn on screen-reader adjustments at any time, users need only to press the Alt+1 keyboard combination. Screen-reader users also get automatic announcements to turn the Screen-reader mode on as soon as they enter the website.
These adjustments are compatible with all popular screen readers, including JAWS and NVDA.
Keyboard navigation optimization: The background process also adjusts the website’s HTML, and adds various behaviors using JavaScript code to make the website operable by the keyboard. This includes the ability to navigate the website using the Tab and Shift+Tab keys, operate dropdowns with the arrow keys, close them with Esc, trigger buttons and links using the Enter key, navigate between radio and checkbox elements using the arrow keys, and fill them in with the Spacebar or Enter key.Additionally, keyboard users will find quick-navigation and content-skip menus, available at any time by clicking Alt+1, or as the first elements of the site while navigating with the keyboard. The background process also handles triggered popups by moving the keyboard focus towards them as soon as they appear, and not allow the focus drift outside of it.
Users can also use shortcuts such as “M” (menus), “H” (headings), “F” (forms), “B” (buttons), and “G” (graphics) to jump to specific elements.
We aim to support the widest array of browsers and assistive technologies as possible, so our users can choose the best fitting tools for them, with as few limitations as possible. Therefore, we have worked very hard to be able to support all major systems that comprise over 95% of the user market share including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera and Microsoft Edge, JAWS and NVDA (screen readers), both for Windows and for MAC users.
Despite our very best efforts to allow anybody to adjust the website to their needs, there may still be pages or sections that are not fully accessible, are in the process of becoming accessible, or are lacking an adequate technological solution to make them accessible. Still, we are continually improving our accessibility, adding, updating and improving its options and features, and developing and adopting new technologies. All this is meant to reach the optimal level of accessibility, following technological advancements. For any assistance, please reach out to webrequests@digitalis.com