DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
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Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#2Very weak argument for why they do it. Using a service to retrieve a favicon? Surely there's a way to implement the same logic locally.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#3This is concerning because it indicates a lack of care in terms of privacy and understanding that the best privacy is achieved by knowing the least. Does this approach permeate their backend as well?
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#4Does this only occur in DuckDuckGo’s Android browser?
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#5Essentially a way to collect where people are visiting. I believe them that it’s anonymous, this valuable info wouldn’t need to be identifiable to be of value.
They should probably change the behavior to how it’s suggested in the thread, but I’m still going to use DDG over alternatives for the bang feature.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#6I don't really trust DuckDuckGo, but I use their search service because I trust Google less... I still trust Firefox more for a browser although it won't take much at this point to make me switch.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#7Nevermind privacy. How are favicons so complicated that they need a special service that understands edge cases. Just do it one standard way and if a minority of websites don't work, then exclude them. We've been through this mess before with all kinds of web standards devolving into mess.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#8This is a bad look for a company that is trying to build its brand on privacy and trust. Even though I don't use the DDG browser I hope they own up to this, rectify it quickly, and learn from it.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#9Do they release the source of the webservice? Seemingly not. This is extremely shady.
Re: DuckDuckGo browser seemingly sends domains a user visits to DDG servers
#10EDIT: I didn't notice that this topic was about the DDG browser (which I didn't know existed) and responded assuming this was about the site/extension. For a browser, yes, a client-side solution is possible and probably preferable. Please check and upvote other comment trees.
This makes sense to me and is not alarming. Getting favicons actually is difficult to do robustly; many applications and websites use Google's service to do so, which then leaks the request to Google: https://www.google.com/s2/favicons?domain=ycombinator.com
Putting this logic in the client is not feasible. You want to send requests directly to every shady site that shows up in your search results, load their pages in the background, work through network delays and HTTP errors, and parse out the location/format of the favicon files?
DuckDuckGo hosting this functionality themselves is also a positive. They have previously been burned when the Web of Trust service they were originally using was found to be farming data, and turned it off immediately once discovered. Processing, hosting, and serving the icon themselves prevents that from happening again.
This is not to say that DDG is perfect: links you click do seem to be redirected through a /l/ page on their domain, which can cause problems: https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/duckduckgo.html