While
Google's market share has not seen a noticeable dent, privacy search engines
like US-based DuckDuckGo and European-based Ixquick have seen jumps in traffic
from users seeking to limit their online tracks.
"I
think people are seeking out privacy alternatives," said Gabriel Weinberg,
founder of DuckDuckGo, an engine created in 2007, which does not store IP
addresses or create profiles of users.
The stored
data has become a concern following revelations of a massive surveillance
program run by the secretive National Security Agency, with access to data from
Google, Yahoo! and other Internet firms.
US
officials say the information gathered is vital in the fight against global
terrorism.
The same
data and profiles can be used by the search engine to deliver ads and sold to
outside marketers as well.
"What
people type in their search engines is their most personal things,"
Weinberg said. "It's a little creepy that a search engine can know so much
about you."
DuckDuckGo
had been growing slowly in recent years, but its traffic charts showed a surge
after the first news broke June 6 of the government's PRISM surveillance
program. By June 20, traffic had hit nearly three million queries, double the
level of a year earlier.
More than
half of DuckDuckGo traffic comes from outside the United States, Weinberg said.
"This
NSA story played into the trend of people's fears" about online tracking,
said Weinberg.
Weinberg
said another factor is that Google results are being gamed by search engine
spammers and other companies trying to rank their results higher."
Dutch-based
Ixquick, which also uses the name StartPage, said it too has seen a dramatic
jump in usage after news of the PRISM data sharing program.
Last week,
the two meta-search engines -- which use the results of Google and other search
sites and strip out identifying information -- served as many as 3.6 million
queries.
"This
growth has been sustained, it shows no signs of slowing down," said spokeswoman
Katherine Albrecht.
The
revelations about PRISM "really have woken people up," she said.
"People
had heard the message of privacy but hadn't been able to nail it down to how it
relates to them."
The company
proclaims it "has never turned over user data to any government entity
anywhere on earth" and is "not directly subject to US
jurisdiction."
Another
search engine, California-based Blekko, allows users to select privacy settings
and keeps no data if the user selects "do not track."
"Even
if you are not a criminal, you probably make searches that you don't want your
minister, boss, or spouse to know about," said Blekko's Greg Lindahl.
Weinberg
said DuckDuckGo's model allows it to make money through "keyword"
advertising, without stored profiles. So if someone is searching for a
"mortgage," they might see ads for banks.
This
differs from search engines that track the pages people visit and then deliver
related ads, a practice known as "retargeting."
"Retargeting
is effective only for a small amount of people, the rest are just annoyed by
it," he said.
Danny
Sullivan, editor in chief at the specialized website Search Engine Land, said
these kinds of search engines were "interesting" but unlikely to have
a major market impact.
"It's
extremely unlikely in the next three to five years that any player will come
along and take a sizeable share away from Google," he said.
A survey of
the US market by the research firm comScore showed Google with a 66.5 percent
market share, with 13.3 billion search queries in a month, followed by
Microsoft (17.3 percent, 3.5 billion) and Yahoo! (12 percent, 2.4 billion).
Sullivan
said the news over NSA surveillance "so far doesn't seem to be
spooking" the public.
He said
Google does not force people to create a profile that can be used to connect
with its other services.
"You
can go to Google, and you can do a search without being logged in, and you
still get very good results," Sullivan said.
"If
you do log in and connect to these services, Google blows DuckDuckGo out of the
water. When it has access to your calendar and search history, Google can
predict your answers before you even ask them."
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