[didibus]

Yeah, abduction reasoning is still useful, it can serve to orient us in our surroundings, aka, it can help us explore the search space from places that are more likely to be correct. So it's still a useful form of reasoning.

Just don't make the mistake of thinking it proves the consequent.

I'd much have preferred the tweet said:

"DuckDuckGo doesn't have any search histories by design and, this might be the reason why we've had 0 search warrants."

But it said:

"DuckDuckGo doesn't have any search histories by design and, bc of that, has had 0 search warrants"

That's a strong assertion, and it's not been demonstrated. You could likely say that it is because the police had never had a case where they needed too, given the lack of popularity of DDG, they might have found all they needed through other sources of warrants. Or it could be any other reason, like they don't even know it exists, or anything else I'm not thinking of.

[kortilla]

Or you fundamentally misunderstand how warrants are issued and don’t realize that in order for the warrant to search something to be issued, the court (judge) first confirms that it’s something that actually can be searched.