CEO and founder of Duck Duck Go will censor websites he deems are spreading Russian disinformation. His reason is that he is “sickened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the gigantic humanitarian crisis it continues to create.”
I need to update this article, however. I checked out other search engines and Duck Duck Go is still the fairest. Brave Search and Presearch give all the legacy when you put in search results. Let’s hope this isn’t a bad sign for Duck Duck Go.
Everyone is sickened by the terror and destruction Putin is leveling on Ukraine. But censoring free speech is still wrong.
Duck Duck Go will down-rank the sites, and hide what he sees as misinformation.
Once he does this, he is compromising his founding principle. Will he do it again? Was he bullied by the WOKEs?
Of course, the Ukraine situation is horrific. However, that doesn’t mean it’s okay to compromise principles and the Bill of Rights. But as we said in the update, he’s still the best.
Like so many others I am sickened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the gigantic humanitarian crisis it continues to create. #StandWithUkraine️
At DuckDuckGo, we’ve been rolling out search updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation.
— Gabriel Weinberg (@yegg) March 10, 2022
In addition to down-ranking sites associated with disinformation, we also often place news modules and information boxes at the top of DuckDuckGo search results (where they are seen and clicked the most) to highlight quality information for rapidly unfolding topics.
— Gabriel Weinberg (@yegg) March 10, 2022
DuckDuckGo’s mission is to make simple privacy protection accessible to all. Privacy is a human right and transcends politics, which is why about 100 million people around the world use DuckDuckGo. (We don’t have an exact count since we don’t track people.)
— Gabriel Weinberg (@yegg) March 10, 2022
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I am extremely upset. Freedom of speech! Looking for a new search engine.
Try Startpage
Disinformation consists of lies rather than opinions:
disinformationnoun
Deliberately misleading information announced publicly or leaked by a government or especially by an intelligence agency in order to influence public opinion or the government in another nation.
Dissemination of such misleading information.
The dissemination of intentionally false information to deliberately confuse or mislead.
In no way can this be conflated with OPINION. I would be against DDG for filtering opinion or statements of happenings that are not demonstrably factual.
Filtering out blatant lies being published on social media and biased fake-news outlets for political reasons is not comparable to filtering out opinions. If DuckDuckGo has credible evidence from reliable sources that lies are being published to generate false narratives concerning the FACTS of what Russian is doing in Ukraine and elsewhere, the removal of the lies is justified. Fuck the Russian government! Fuck Putin! …and fuck everybody that spreads Russia’s lies!
Reading about Russia potentially seizing all assets of western crony capitalist fascists and the $121 billion that Russia owes to western banks will never be paid.
Is a society this soft and weak ready for total WAR.