[ DuckDuckGo Privacy Weekly ] For May 21, 2020

• What do Spotify, Venmo, Tinder, TikTok & DoorDash have in common? Their apps all crashed last week because they send data to Facebook, and Facebook had a bug! Since tracking code is in so many apps, we strongly recommend deleting apps you rarely use. [arstechnica.com]
• Phone-based scams are becoming increasingly sophisticated and hard for even experts to detect. If you get a call from a financial institution, the best defense is to hang up and call them back, using a number you look up yourself online. [krebsonsecurity.com]
• Public health apps, e.g. for coronavirus, can only work if people trust them, and that trust has to be built on well-thought-out safeguards. Now is "a crucial time to decide what standards to have in place on how our data is handled," reports Alfred Ng. [cnet.com]

Our thoughts

• Your online activity should not be under constant surveillance. We're proud to sign this letter in support of protecting search and browsing history. [twitter.com]

And finally, Google's search preference menu for Android in the EU is currently an auction with only four options. This creates false scarcity to boost its revenue and suppress competition, especially suppressing private search engines. That's because private search engines will not be able to afford the bidding process long-term as they make less money per search relative to search engines that exploit personal information as their business model. A much better way to give consumers choice is to allow unlimited options, for free.

We've gathered new data showing that with unlimited options (available by scrolling) and better design (e.g. search engine descriptions shown by default), 24% of people select Google alternatives (the most frequent by far being a private search engine). This is 8x the current 3% combined mobile market share of these alternatives. [spreadprivacy.com]

Proudly Private,



Dax the Duck
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