

It appears that the terms of that contract require that Microsoft-owned services, such as Bing and LinkedIn, continue to do the usual third-party user tracking that DuckDuckGo’s browser usually blocks. Tapping into the results of services such as Yahoo and Bing means striking deals with their owners, in this case a syndicated search content contract with Microsoft. DuckDuckGo relies on the search APIs from a number of other vendors, Microsoft included, and focuses on making the results anonymous and free from the sort of user tracking that puts personal information in the hands of data brokers. DuckDuckGo allows Microsoft trackers through the gate?īuilding a useful web search engine is no easy task, one of the reasons that Google still dominates the space after more than 20 years. This search partnership agreement appears to be giving Bing and LinkedIn special permission to engage in user tracking for those using the DuckDuckGo Privacy Browser, as confirmed by DuckDuckGo CEO Gabriel Weinberg.

The company pulls results from a variety of partners, but relies heavily on Bing results that are filtered for extra user privacy. Questions have now been raised about DuckDuckGo’s relationship with Microsoft.
