China has blocked DuckDuckGo, the privacy search engine, that recently made big news when Apple added them as a default search option to iOS and their upcoming desktop operating system. The Founder and CEO of DuckDuckGo, Gabriel Weinberg, confirmed that his search engine was blocked by Chinese regulators. He confirmed this yesterday on Twitter and […]
Google has begun processing and removing the approved submissions done through the right to the Right To Be Forgotten Form. The Right To Be Forgotten is a European Court Of Justice ruling from May 2014 that EU citizens could request that search engines remove links to pages deemed private, even if the pages themselves remain […]
ABC.com reported yesterday that Google Maps has launched street view images in Greece. According to the story, Greece authorities blocked Google Maps Street Views five years ago because of privacy issues. According to ABC.com: Company officials said the service went live after extensive and detailed negotiations with the country’s Data Protection Authority, which last year […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Big Win For DuckDuckGo: Apple Adding To Safari As Private Search Option DuckDuckGo, the search engine that positions itself as a completely secure and private search engine, is getting a big […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: DuckDuckGo Relaunches & Starts To Look Like A Real Search Engine DuckDuckGo, the spunky little search engine that hangs its hat on user privacy, has relaunched today with a new look […]
On Thursday, Google released yet another algorithm update, no – not the Penguin update, but an algorithm to combat mugshot web sites from showing up highly in their search results. In February, Jonathan Hochman wrote a story here named Why Google Should Crack Down Harder On The Mugshot Extortion Racket. That story, according to Google’s […]
Twitter has made a small change in how it handles protected tweets in its search results. The company tweeted the news that some protected tweets will now be visible in search results — but they’ll only be visible to the user who has the protected account, and to that user’s followers. Prior to this change, […]
Apple Insider points out that Apple is hiring for dozens of positions in its mapping group. There are more than 80 positions that respond to the keywords “Apple Maps” on the company’s jobs site. Among a range of other positions, Apple has been seeking “ground truth local experts” for various cities. Here’s one such job […]
StartPage and Ixquick, sister search engines that offer private searching, announced that they surpassed four million daily direct searches on Monday. The announcement comes about three weeks after the parent company announced that they reached three million daily searches for the first time. Ixquick CEO Robert Beens credits the higher search activity to public reaction […]
DuckDuckGo (DDG) has launched a new iOS app called Search & Stories to go along with the Android app that’s been available since late 2011. The app offers many of the same features as DuckDuckGo’s Web-based search engine, particularly the anonymous searching that has earned DDG a lot of media attention after the NSA/PRISM privacy […]
Microsoft’s “Scroogled” ad campaign, which attacked Google over paid inclusion in shopping and Gmail over privacy, is coming to an end. KQED reports that Microsoft will stop TV, newspaper and social media ads promoting the Scroogled message: “That part is about finished,” Stefan Weitz, Microsoft senior director of online services, said on Thursday. Microsoft launched […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: DuckDuckGo’s New Video Targets Google’s “Filter Bubble” Of Personalized Results DuckDuckGo’s ongoing mission to challenge Google (and other search engines, but mainly Google) on privacy issues has taken another turn with […]
A change in iOS 6 made by Apple and not anticipated by Google means that for the past week or so — and likely for some weeks to come — those reaching web sites from Google’s search engine after doing searches from within Safari will be counted as “direct” traffic rather than “search” traffic. As […]
Facebook announced users will soon be able to delete their search activity under their “Activity Log.” The feature is being released over the next couple weeks to all Facebook users. Currently, Facebook users are able to delete other activity, like status updates, under the Activity Log. Now, Facebook will be allowing you to do the […]
Microsoft announced on the Bing Search blog that you can now search Bing to discover your friends’ photos within Facebook. If you activated the social bar within Bing and enabled Facebook to connect to Bing, then your search results in the Bing social bar may have photos from your friends’ Facebook feeds. You can also […]
The interwebs are all a flutter over how a critic of NBC’s Olympic coverage had his Twitter account suspended after tweeting the email address of the executive in charge of that coverage. It was private, said Twitter. Public to anyone with Google, said journalist Guy Adams, whose account was suspended. Actually, from what I can […]
Firefox 14 has officially launched today, which means all Google searches are encrypted by default. However, due to a Google loophole, the encryption will not prevent things you search for from “leaking” out to Google’s advertisers nor potentially showing up as search suggestions or in data reported to web sites through Google Webmaster Central. The Firefox […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: 5 Ways Conversion Takes Market Share Like Candy From A Baby They are out there, and they are not nice. They seek to take food from the mouths of your children […]
Here’s a shocker*: Microsoft’s Streetside service has hit a bumpy road in Germany. The company says it’s shut down Streetside imagery in Germany after complaints about the way the company was handling blurring requests. Microsoft spokesperson Thomas Baumgartner tells PCWorld that he’s not sure if or when Streetside will be reinstated in Germany. A Microsoft […]
Some in Israel are calling foul after images of what’s described as a “secret base” in the Tel Aviv area have appeared on Google’s Street View service. But the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) — the country’s defense department — says everything is fine. According to an English-language article from Ynetnews, soldiers and vehicles inside a […]
Although a formal launch is planned for this weekend, Google’s Street View imagery for Israel is already online. It marks the first time Google has put street photographs online from any Middle Eastern country. Shown above is a screenshot of the Wailing Wall (also called the Western Wall) in Jerusalem, one of the city’s most […]
Microsoft has confirmed that they do discover and index URLs that they find through users surfing the Internet with the Bing Toolbar installed. This can be a concern for those who know certain URLs are only accessible if the individual knows about it and navigates to the URL with the Bing Toolbar installed. For example, […]
Google’s about to make a change to how it reports referrer information for those using its Chrome browser. As a result, some analytics programs may begin listing search visitors as if they instead came directly from Google without doing a search, though major packages will probably adjust OK. The change was posted on the Google […]
Personalized search? Both Google and Bing will tell you that it provides better results. But two-thirds say they don’t care. They view personalized search as a “bad thing,” a new survey finds. Nearly three-quarters also view gathering data to personalize results to be a privacy invasion. The findings come out of a survey from the Pew Internet & […]
Yesterday, Bing rolled out a new “Linked Pages” feature that looks interesting. But using the feature gives Bing permission to post to Facebook on your behalf. That’s a lot of permission that seems necessary only as a way for Bing to pimp itself. It also means your friends might soon be posting Linked Pages to […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Panda Update Costs Demand Media $6.4 Million In 4th Quarter? Demand Media posts $6.4-million loss in fourth quarter from the Los Angeles Times reports that Google’s Panda algorithm is mostly […]
Microsoft’s Streetside photo service will be taking photos across Europe before the end of the year. The expansion comes on the heels of its launch in Germany earlier this year — a move that’s generated far less resistance than Google’s Street View service. According to German news reports today, Bing’s Streetside service has received about […]
Yesterday Google Software Engineer Ebby Amirebrahimi announced new features that allow users to lock posts and disable comments. The lock option had previously existed, but could only occur after the share had actually occured. How To Lock Posts Or Disable Comments Before Posting To Stream In order to turn comments off on a post before […]
Mark Zuckerberg at F8, the Facebook developer conference held last week, exhorted people to “tell their life story” on Facebook via its new Timeline feature. Facebook also promoted new Open Graph apps integration and so-called “frictionless sharing.” But frictionless sharing is already creating a great deal of friction for Facebook in privacy circles and with […]
There have been many stories in the past of criminals (of one sort or another) using Google, Foursquare and Facebook to target people who many not be home or, in the case of Google Earth and Street View, which homes to target. A recent survey of 50 convicted burglars by UK security firm Friedland Response […]
With the smoke still smoldering from Google’s long-running battle over the collection of personal information via unsecured WiFi networks, the company says it’s working on a service that will allow WiFi router owners to opt-out from being included in Google’s location services. In a blog post yesterday, Google says the opt-out will be available to […]
Pew has released some new survey findings showing that roughly 58 percent of smartphone owners use what Pew is calling “geosocial and location-based services.” There’s a mix of activities and applications grouped under these headings, including maps & directions and sites like Yelp and Foursquare among other things. Pew data reflect that 35 percent of […]
There will be extensive discussion and debate today about whether the broad and welcome array of new privacy, tagging and sharing controls on Facebook are or aren’t a response to Google+. I directly asked Facebook that question and was told that the new features have nothing to do with Google+ and have been in the […]
Google’s Street View service is headed to the Middle East. As expected, the Israeli government has given Google a green light to begin driving through the country and placing panoramic images online. The Ministry of Justice’s decision comes after months of discussion with Google about how to allow Street View in the country while still […]
Google is likely to face more privacy-related challenges on the heels of news today that the company’s Street View vehicles have collected more than just the location of WiFi access points. According to a CNET article today, Google collected those WiFi access points along with the location of client devices including mobile phones and desktop […]
Below is today’s top news relating to Google+, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. Googler Shares How Google+ Is Built I’m a technical lead on the Google+ team is an “ask me anything conversation” with Google engineer Joseph Smarr, Technical lead for Google+. Smarr answers 20+ questions on the […]
The irony of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg being the most followed person on Google+ is over. He’s disappeared from the top rankings, along with Google CEO Larry Page who was the second most followed and other Google execs. It’s down to a glitch, Google says. Google+ allows you to show the number of people you […]
The Financial Times has identified a “privacy flaw” within Google+: re-sharing. A privately shared post or picture can be subsequently re-published or shared by the recipient to any of his or her Circles or the entire world. This would potentially thwart the privacy “settings” or objectives of the original creator of the post. Google is […]
I’ve been manically playing with Google Plus for about an hour now and, while there is disagreement here among the editorial team at Search Engine Land, I give it a qualified “thumbs up.” At first glance many people will dismiss Google Plus as redundant and derivative of Twitter and Facebook, in particular. This was also […]
Things have been a little quiet — perhaps even boring — since Eric Schmidt stepped down as Google’s CEO to become the company’s Executive Chairman. The strange quotes and not-so-funny attempts at cracking privacy-related jokes have slowed down in the past couple months. But Schmidt may have just added another one to his collection of […]