Many “alternative” search engines are better for privacy, but they are still vulnerable to censorship, because they rely on g**gle and m*crosoft’s indices for their search results. This isn’t a deep-hidden secret either, many of them disclose what search index they use on the “about” page, for example:

There are still search engines that (claim to) maintain their own index. Most surprisingly, br*ve:

    • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
      46·
      8 months ago

      That crap always reminds me of late 90s GameFAQs where people would think that spelling it “sh!t” wouldn’t get their comment deleted

      • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
        16·
        8 months ago

        I remember a page where people could post gossip about other people, but you weren’t allowed to cuss, so people wrote things like:

        Becky Jones from Jamesdale High is a total sloot. She fricked a bunch of guys and even gave them bjobs and handj’s

  • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
    702·
    8 months ago

    I had a high school friend shill me brave because he worked there. Was genuinely into all the tech bro stuff and gold. So much gold. I used it for maybe 2 weeks before I got tired of the crypto. I should thank him though, that pushed me into FOSSland.

      • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
        663·
        8 months ago

        Thats nice to know. Their CEO is a massive right-wing dickhead. So it doesnt matter whats optional its not worth it to use in the end.

        • PatMustard@feddit.ukEnglish
          0·
          8 months ago

          You shouldn’t base your browser usage on whether or not the boss is a bigot. How many CEOs of big tech companies do you think are lovely people? There are plenty of real reasons not to use Brave, the founder being a knob is just the icing on the cake.

          • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
            11·
            8 months ago

            No, you absolutely should. Don’t use products that enrich pieces of shit. Thats how we got here in the first place by giving the sociopaths the money.

      • renzev@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
        14·
        8 months ago

        opt in

        Unfortunately there is still one thing that you have to opt out of manually, and that is monetized new tab pages. It’s not strictly crypto-related, and it’s only like three clicks to opt-out, but can be slightly annoying if your workflow relies heavily on browser profiles like mine. Still a great browser tho.

  • Funderpants @lemmy.ca
    474·
    8 months ago

    I use Kagi, and while it does use google index, it also uses many other indexes and its own index. I wonder how this impacts censorship.

    https://help.kagi.com/kagi/search-details/search-sources.html

    Edit : Not much detail here but they do comment on it here :

    https://help.kagi.com/kagi/search-details/search-quality.html

    Avoiding Censorship and Bias

    We do our best to avoid censorship and bias. Some results from traditional sources will reflect biases, but they’ll be balanced by results from other sources. Also, we have built product features to help with bias reduction. For example, our “World News” Lens includes articles from respectable media outlets across the globe.

    One of the signals that does influence our ranking is the presence of ads or trackers. We penalize bloated sites regardless of their agendas.

    • balderdash@lemmy.zip
      691·
      8 months ago

      I like the idea, but I can’t justify $10 a month. Downvote me or whatever, but I’m broke and need to cut as many subscriptions as possible.

      • li10@lemmy.ml
        44·
        8 months ago

        That’s fair.

        You could argue that it’s worth the money to get better results and avoid Google, but with so many companies trying to take $10 a month you have to draw the line somewhere.

      • the_weez@midwest.social
        30·
        8 months ago

        No, I’m with you. $120 a year is too steep for searching for me. I like what they are trying to do but I don’t think the average person will spend that much.

      • Norgur@kbin.social
        121·
        8 months ago

        Why downvote? That’s a fair point. There is a free tier with a few free searches per year (2000 or something). You could sign up and use this budget whenever your search engine of choice fails you.

      • Funderpants @lemmy.ca
        8·
        8 months ago

        Yea, I just think I either pay for something like Kagi, or I am subject to something like Google. I’m not sure there is a third way that pays for the servers and talent needed to deliver search results, but my imagination might just be limited.

      • Funderpants @lemmy.ca
        181·
        8 months ago

        Lol, I know how you feel. Not long ago there was suddenly a bunch of chatter about it on Lemmy and I was thinking the same thing, that it had to be marketing. But I’m a curious sort and I was so sick of bad google results so I tried it.

        Now that I have used Kagi I’m convinced it was organic chatter. I really do like it, I think it’s better, and if they offered money for posts I’d take that money because I’m paying $10 a month for a search engine, lol.

      • mac@infosec.pub
        81·
        8 months ago

        I thought this was a possibility at first, then I used it. The lad time is basically instant, the results are always good and it has a bunch of features with AI etc.

      • Funderpants @lemmy.ca
        161·
        8 months ago

        With Kagi I get what I want and sort through way less to no junk. With their lenses I can push reliable sources up and other sources down. I really like it.

        • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
          111·
          8 months ago

          Yeah. I hope that they provide a way to exclude Brave from the search engines (not optimistic considering the libertarian tech bro tantrum the lead dev threw but…).

          But I think the advantage is really the personalized results over anything else. Sometimes you get some REAL fucked up SEO-heavy results. So you just block that site. And then everything works.

          It DOES make me more than a bit concerned over how much data they have on me (especially as you need to use an access token to use it in an incognito window… where you are searching for the sketchiest shit) but… google already has that so…

              • PopOfAfrica@lemmy.world
                5·
                8 months ago

                I will say part of the reason I find them more trustworthy is that their business model hinges on some sort of ounce of privacy. Google’s hinges on exactly the opposite.

                • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
                  6·
                  8 months ago

                  I strongly encourage reading up on the various VPNs and the like that charge people while still monitoring and tracking everything they do.

      • markon@lemmy.world
        22·
        8 months ago

        I’m finding Copilot better than any search and better than buying by itself and world’s better than Google search, but it’s totally not private… So anything you seem sensitive or private you just can’t use it for

        • Doug7070@lemmy.worldEnglish
          51·
          8 months ago

          LLM powered search is so great, if it can’t find the information you’re looking for it will just make up random bullshit for you! And all it costs is Microsoft looming over your shoulder to datamine and sell everything you ever do!

      • deus@lemmy.world
        24·
        8 months ago

        I don’t know how safe it is to use but man, their reverse image search has always impressed me. Miles better than Google’s or Tineye’s.

        • HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org
          14·
          8 months ago

          I always figured the markets that Google didn’t penetrate successfully (Russia with Yandex, China with Baidu, maybe Korea and Japan) probably ended up with their own circle of innovation just because there wasn’t a huge dominant player sucking all the talent and money out of the room. Thry might have gotten an edge through noncompetitive regulatory policy, but that bought them thr time to build domething more duited to local needs.

          Back when it was socially permissible to acknowledge Russia did anything well, Yandex was doing some fairly innovative stuff.

  • fin@sh.itjust.works
    101·
    8 months ago

    Still Privacy >> Censorship. If the search engine is privacy-friendly then we can talk about censorship. No brave bullshit

    And this should be discussed on !privacy@lemmy.ml

    • douglasg14b@lemmy.world
      2·
      8 months ago

      I’ve been spelling this for years…

      Why would you trust a browser whose business model is based on user activity tracking.

      Who before they were even remotely popular or profitable had one of the largest ad campaigns I’ve ever seen for a tech product. Who’s funding that and where is their value proposition coming from for that funding?

      Hell no I’m not going to trust it