Tech

Debian replaces Google with DuckDuckGo as search engine for Chromium

Debian will use DuckDuckGo as default search engine for the Chromium browser, replacing the one that until now had been used, that of Google.

Debian Linux is one of the great references of the free system. Many other distributions are based on its development, starting with the most popular, Ubuntu, which in turn serves as the basis for other GNU/Linux developments. The influence of Debian is enormous and hence the importance of the news that concerns us.

It must be said that Debian, like most Linux systems, uses Firefox as its default web browser. It is not foreseeable that this will change in the short term, although Mozilla’s development situation is not the best.

However, Debian also offers another browser in its repositories, chrome, the open source project that Google has built Chrome on. Many Linux users prefer it as it offers almost the same features as Chrome, but without the Google services and related tracking and data collection. And that’s where the default search engine change comes in.

DuckDuckGo by Google

This change was announced more than two years ago and is now specified as of Chromium version 104. The reasons are known: privacy. And it is that the scandals of massive surveillance, data violations and non-transparent practices, have allowed the emergence of alternative engines that promise greater privacy and a return of results that is not so influenced by commercial and advertising reasons.

Debian will use DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo heads the list of these alternative search engines to the giants of the sector such as Google Search, Microsoft Bing or Yahoo!. An open source development that is committed to privacy as its main feature and is in fact the default engine in other browsers such as TOR.

Its increase in use has been enormous in the last two years and although it is still a long way from the data of the great leader in the segment, Google Search, there is no doubt that it has managed to make a name for itself in engines and launch other developments such as its own browser or an email solution.

Of course, not everything has been congratulations and the controversy over the “syndicated search content contract” with Microsoft, which allowed Microsoft’s advertising trackers to run, while blocking Google and Facebook’s trackers, still resonates and has perhaps broken DuckDuckGo’s promotion as champion of privacy and transparency. And it is that, although it is better than Google in terms of privacy, it must be said that there are others that are even more private than DuckDuckGo, although perhaps not as efficient.

In Debian they have had to put everything in the balance to select it as a replacement for Google in Chromium. The fact that it is delivered by default does not mean that other alternatives (or Google itself) cannot be used, because all browsers allow you to make the change very easily in the Configuration tool.

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