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:

    • Funderpants @lemmy.ca
      162·
      11 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
        133·
        11 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
              6·
              11 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
                102·
                11 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.