Skip to main content

Why you should quit using Google Search!

Let's begin with the obvious facts:
Google Search is not prone for its privacy and user anonymity. In fact, the goal of most companies from the valley is about farming data about you. It's not that they want to scam or blackmail you. The goal is to create a personal image of the user to target ads and campaigns for companies that try to reach a specific audience. A vacuum manufacturer obviously tries to reach people that regularly use a vacuum and have an interest in having a nice and functioning one. So, the perfect audience for a vacuum ad could be housewives and professional cleaning companies for example.
Like I mentioned in one of my previous posts about privacy, cookies are one of the main data access points for creating a user profile.
With the help of the EU, users have gained the ability to check the cookie usages on websites and can choose to only save the necessary cookies to have a properly functioning website. 

But there are alternatives in which data can help the environment or keep your data away from advertisement companies while searching. This helps you to avoid checking your Google Account Setting every six months for unexpected changes.


Save the planet: Ecosia Search

Ecosia is particularly popular between teenagers of the millennial generation and has already replaced Google Search for lots of web users. 
It uses Bing Search from Microsoft and is unique because of the fact that every search session of an user has a positive impact to the environment.
It sound shady but is quite simple and innovative: With every search on Ecosia, the user gets a very clearly marked ads. A vast majority of the money earned by these ads goes to projects that plant trees all around the world. Roughly every 45th search equals one newly planted tree.
The company planted more then 77 Million trees by now. 
This alternative is the right one to choose if you care about the environment and want to use even the last possible way of saving the it. 
There is even an App for the Safari Web Browser on MacOS so check it out and give it a try. 
Android users can download the Ecosia Browser onto their phones and tablets. 
Ecosia Search is free and you can always switch between the engines if you find one specific use case where the search results seam inaccurate. 


Privacy all the way: DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo has been around for a while now and has gained popularity because of the recent privacy and data breach issues of many other popular tech companies such as Facebook and Adobe. 
It also relies on the Bing Search Engines from Microsoft and is quite accurate when it comes to searching news, facts or even important things for university. 
DuckDuckGo is claiming to let the users search without being stalked or becoming an object to milk ad-money off with search profiling. 
This alternative is the one to choose, if you what every bit of your searches to be privat and anonymous.
Like Ecosia, this alternative is also free. So go ahead and check it out.


Conclusion

There are many other alternatives and ways to keep your search meta datas away from big corporations. My post obviously tries to lead you to look into other ways to use the web and looking after your data. 
This is just the tip of the iceberg for secure web and computer usage. If you are interessted in topics like these, I would suggest you to follow me on Twitter (@OnurSuembuel) for new updates on privacy and new blog posts. 
Let's keep on looking after our valuable data and support these companies!

Labels:
Location: Rhein-Main-Gebiet, Deutschland

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How To Keep Your Phone For A Longer Time - Guide

Smartphones have become more than just basic communication devices that replace home line phones. They are our point-and-shoot cameras, navigation units, media consumption devices and add many more unique features to help us out in real world use-cases. With every new year comes a new generation of SoCs, camera sensors, charging and display technologies. This is also why it is tempting to buy the newest flagship phone on the market.  Adding the hype around these devices, people most are likely willing to upgrade sooner to the next gen devices then their use-cases require.  This creates many problems: First, changing phones every one or two years creates a large amount of waste and that way harms the environment. Also, new devices need resources that are most likely only available in mines with inferior labor rights compared to modern industrial countries. Well known cases of child labor and slavery shouldn't become a norm to satisfy the public.  But w...
Post a Comment
Read more

How To Fix Your Macbook Keyboard (Software Solution Included)

A while back I wrote about problems that could occur with modern notebooks. I mentioned the keyboard problem of many MacBooks released after 2016.  A quick recap of the issue: These laptops have a refined keyboard mechanism with new "butterfly" switches. This was allegedly a necessity since Apple wanted to make the newest iterations of their notebooks quite thinner and decided to develop a new keyboard mechanism with less travel and hight being used in the case.  The keyboards can have some problems such as double or even more keystrokes when pressing on one key. My keyboard was especially affected by this with the "E" and space key. Some users also report being unable to press the button because of it being hard.  Apple acknowledges these problems and mentions that this problem only affects a small user base. From experience, I can say that it depends on the usage of your keyboard. If you are a student who types a lot, then the risk of getting prob...
Post a Comment
Read more

How to make your PC faster for free or cheap

Note: I'm not responsible for any kind of damages caused by your actions or my advices. This is just an article with some tips for you to have an overview of your options when having an issue with a computer.  A while ago, I saw an advertisement about a USB Stick that claims to make your PC run like a new one while I was browsing YouTube. The product looked like a basic SanDisk USB Drive and was connected to an older HP Laptop from about 2009.  First it seemed like a scam and I was ready to report it. But a few seconds in, I noticed that in a comparison between the Notebook with and without the stick, that the PCs had totally different environments running. At this point I was pretty sure of what was going on here. What was happening? The ad shows a ferly old notebook running Windows Vista to compare the speed against the same notebook with the promoted product plugged in. The basic Vista Notebook is struggling to open up a video without the Stick...
Post a Comment
Read more