Eco-friendly search engines (and other free goodies!)
Also choose a decent browser that is quick, so you spend less time online. Visit Browse Happy and pick your favourite.
Google is efficient, but many of the following search engines work with Google, while at the same time supporting eco-friendly causes:
Ecosia (add to Chrome – it’s free) is solar-powered and donates 80% of revenue from ads to non-profits . So far it’s planted over 200 million trees (including 3.5 million in Brazil – and reforested an area destroyed by wildfires) It’s now the biggest reforestation scheme on the planet.
To switch, just click the three dots at top right of your screen, click settings, then select ‘switch search engine’. You’ll find the option for Ecoisa. Select and you’re done!
Ocean Hero sponsors others to remove five plastic bottles from the ocean, each time you search the web. It pays people in economic poverty to recover ocean-bound plastic in Indonesia, Haiti, Brazil and the Philippines.
Startpage is a private search engine that never saves or sells your history, a free extension to Google chrome. Based in The Netherlands, your IP address is removed from servers, and third parties are blocked from accessing third party data to target you.
Anonymous View acts like a VPN, but without an account or fees. Just click the option under search results to activate. The company makes money through (sponsored links). You have the option of removing AI results.
Mojeek provides independent results from Google or Bing, through their own ranking algorithms. Therefore results are quite different (you can also turn off Wikipedia results if you don’t want them). As results are not coming through other search engines, results are faster. And does not crawl child sexual abuse materials or malware.
DuckDuckGo is used by tens of millions of people, blocking trackers from Google and Facebook, targeted ads and cookie pop-ups. It also blocks email trackers and deletes browsing data with one simple button.
Swisscows (free on Google chrome) is a family-friendly search engine, with no violent or pornographic content. With no storage or sharing (Switzerland has high protection standards). It also offers affordable VPN.
Do search engines really track you?
Some build profile datas to target you via ads, and there are safety concerns for those who wish to remain anonymous (say people on witness protection schemes or escaping domestic abuse).
It’s not usually possible for search engines to stop child abuse, as most is carried out on peer-to-peer networks like What’s App or the so-called ‘dark web’.
Report concerns to Internet Watch Foundation and Childline’s Report Remove tool.
Good preventive measures include:
- Encouraging children to spend less time online.
- Teaching children about online safety
- Choosing smartphones for kids with built-in safety apps
- Bark app is a good solution for the US (not available elsewhere).
Free secure Swiss email accountsÂ
Switzerland has much better security laws than England. So you can switch to their free emails and you won’t get tracked or need to give your phone number etc (you can as a back-up, but it’s not needed to open an account).
Choose from Proton Mail or Swisscows.email.
Free extensions to simplify online life
- Free Adplus Block. In one second, pop-ups ads and other annoying stuff disappears. You’ll never go back. You can whitelist certain sites if wished. Most newspapers won’t let you read anything if you don’t whitelist them, but that’s quite a good idea not to! You’ll have much better mental health.
- Unhook is another free download. This one removes all the ‘recommended videos’ in sidebars, if you watch a YouTube video.
- I Don’t Care About Cookies again is free. This stops all the cookie pop-ups that you have to accept, each time you visit a website.
How to stop annoying captchas
These are super-annoying, when you have to solve puzzles to reach a website. It has serious repercussions too (say you needed urgent medical advice or wanted to find lost pets). You don’t want to spend your time clicking zebra crossings or fire hydrants.
These are put out there to stop ‘bots’, and thankfully some are now getting simpler. It’s on the onus of websites and companies to switch:
- Cloudflare Turnstile uses simple code to confirm visitors are real (yet still blocks bots) and does not slow down your website.
- Friendly Captcha enables easy access to the website, yet still blocks bots and spam.
