Podcast Recommendation about Search Engine Privacy

Posted on Jul 18, 2023

tl;dr: The Opt Out Pod interviewed Kelly Finnerty, the Director of Brand and Startpage. Its a great interview that covers the importance of using a private search engine and I think its something you can recommend to friends and family to listen to and understand why search engine privacy is important.

Earlier this week I was perusing the back catalog for the Opt Out Podcast and caught an episode about private search. I was intrigued because I’ve had about enough of DuckDuckGo. The search results aren’t good on DDG and they are thin. Often after the first 5 or so results it just delivers random stuff that has nothing to do with my search.

I was thinking about using Startpage and the Opt Out Pod has an interview with Kelly Finnerty, who is the Director of Brand for Startpage.

This is a fantastic interview and Kelly does a great job explaining not just what Startpage does, but also why people should want to use a private search engine. There were several ah-ha moments for me and I’m an avid privacy advocate and follow these things closely. This quote was one moment:

…I can search for these queries knowing that I am truly the only one looking for this and it won’t be used in a digital ad later on, or it won’t be used in a criminal or civil law case to set the tone of who I am as a person.

Its that last bit that stood out to me.

People who have never dealt with legal issues could think that using search history for a criminal law case would be used for assault or even murder cases. This is true, but far from the only instance. As a small business owner, I can see how requesting my search queries from Google could be used against me if I am ever sued. I can see how they could be used in a divorce or child custody hearing. I can see how they could be used in many other situations like defamation, disability, workers compensation, bankruptcy, and more.

This is a great episode of the Opt Out Podcast.

Now, I don’t think privacy advocates will get a ton of new info from it (although I think its worth your time). However, it is a great podcast to share with family and friends to help them understand why privacy is important. It may even be a moment for them to understand why using Google for everything is bad.

Check out the episode here: Private search via Startpage w/ Kelly Finnerty | Opt Out Podcast

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