Founder: privacy-friendly search engine DuckDuckGo is profitable

The privacy-friendly search engine DuckDuckGo is profitable. That’s what founder Gabriel Weinberg says in response to questions on HackerNews. DuckDuckGo makes its money by serving non-targeted ads.

DuckDuckGo only offers ads based on a search term, such as car ads for the search term “car,” Weinberg told HackerNews. “Those ads are lucrative because people have the intent to buy something when they search for it.” Ads based on tracking are less effective, he says, because people see them even if they have no intention of buying something.

The search engine started a few years ago as a privacy-friendly alternative to regular search engines. For example, DuckDuckGo says it does not save search history and does not collect private data from users. Since last year, users of iPhones and iPads can set DuckDuckGo as the default in Safari.