[whywhywhywhy]

>Do we want, at a time when Russia is considering the UK as an enemy, to be providing all our personal details to a server in Moscow?

Depends how good the search is. Google doesn’t seem to want to provide me proper results anymore, even very basic image search tasks on google now net you only about 20 results all of which are wrong or useless. Yandex image search actually works.

If you don’t want me to use the Russian tech that helps me get my job done then roll back the Google Search codebase 10 years to when it worked as well as Yandex does today. (Only partially joking)

[kypro]

I wrote a comment a few years back how I was using Yandex quite a bit at the time because there are things I'm simply unable to find on Google – sites like sci-hub for example.

Today though I find myself using it daily. The results are far from perfect, but I've never suspected them to be randomly hiding or suppressing search results like many of the popular Western alternatives.

I don't use image search much, but yes I completely agree with you there. Google image search is completely unusable to me at this point, so I always default to Bing and Yandex for that (still need to try Brave). And Yandex imo is the only search engine with a functional reverse image search anymore.

[sva_]

> sites like sci-hub for example

To be fair, that is not Google's fault.

It always cracks me up that when you see the DMCA note on the bottom and you click on it, you get to see the hosts anyways:

https://lumendatabase.org/notices/26024315

[atahanacar]

That is how I search for pirated content.

[WeylandYutani]

Yes the Russians don't really produce a lot of software or entertainment that Westerners want. So they have no stake in enforcement of copyright.

[FirmwareBurner]

>Senders: [...] Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH

Why am I not surprised to see Springer as one of the claimants? /rhetorical question

[Barrin92]

>but I've never suspected them to be randomly hiding or suppressing search results

the word 'random' must be doing a lot of work in that sentence given that they are subject to Roskomnadzor's regulations and are thus forced not just arbitrarily but systematically censor content: https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/02/01/a-window-into-yandex...

[veave]

But us westerners usually don't care much about that kind of censorship because it doesn't affect the searches we normally do. ("normally" as in "we usually don't search stuff about russian politics")

[mrguyorama]

How about if you do searches about history? In Russia, it is explicitly a crime to portray the "Great patriotic War" as anything but noble, wonderful, and a huge russian success story. Multiple game developers have active warrants for arrest in russia because they put a russian tank in their game that isn't OP, or have a campaign that accurately demonstrates an unsavory thing the soviets did in the 40s.

[throw-ru-938]

While I was still living in Russia, llvm.org was blocked for several years because fuck you we balling.

[mc32]

It looks like the best solution is for “westerners” to use Yandex and everyone else to use Google or Bing and this way they can search with less targeted censoring on their terms.

[daveguy]

Are people in Russia allowed to use Google? I thought Russia has been locking down their Internet for a while. Not as bad as China, but still missing anything unflattering to Putie.

[throw-ru-938]

Google properties are still unblocked, for now. But, yes, Internet censorship in Russia went into overdrive with the invasion.

[unsupp0rted]

Why don't you just click on Google Image Search's Pinterest links?

[Phemist]

www.tineye.com is also a pretty good image searcher.

[gs17]

It's better than what Google offers now, but still worse than Yandex.

[roenxi]

There is a reasonable argument that, as a minor nobody, we should rather use services from hostile countries. It isn't feasible for Russia to to compel someone in an English-speaking country to do something unpleasant. That is a lot more than can be said for the local police or politicians. Russian corruption doesn't generally touch Western governments - the atmosphere is too hostile to it.

[dindobre]

>Russian corruption doesn't generally touch Western governments

No offense but the fact that someone on HN could get to this conclusion is rather shocking to me. Western Europe has plenty of russian corruption and I'm afraid the ongoing war has unearthed only a fraction of it.

[slashdev]

For example?

[FirmwareBurner]

Austria is the lobbying arm and safe heaven of Russian banks, oil & gas and oligarchs in the EU, and vice versa, Austrian banks and companies are heavily invested in Russia, and you don't just get to be a major investor in Russia without the bribes, connections and blessing of some very high up people in the government.

Pretty sure plenty of German politicians were similarly cozy with Russia before.

[roenxi]

While there will be obvious corruption involved in that, voting for access to cheap energy and access to foreign economies for investment are both things I'm in favour of. Being warm in winter and being wealthy are both good outcomes. So corruption is bad in all its forms, but that corruption doesn't threaten me.

A pretty basic assumption about Google and Facebook is that the US 3 letter agencies use the data in coups. Speaking as an Australian, the next time we have a Whitlam-style dismissal I assume Google will be covertly involved. Yandex not so much. Similar logic would hold in the Americas, Asia, and most of Western Europe. It'd be fascinating to know what role US social media companies were playing in the 2014 Ukraine revolution too as a comparison to somewhere that is very much a place where Russia would want to weaponise Yandexq.

[FirmwareBurner]

>Being warm in winter and being wealthy are both good outcomes.

You can be warm in the winter without doing deals with "the devil", and most average Austrian people don't benefit from that corrupt "trade", just a few banks and oil execs and real estate moguls who get to become even richer, unless you're gonna tell that their immense riches will "trickle down" to us plebs, any minute now.

>A pretty basic assumption about Google and Facebook is that the US 3 letter agencies use the data in coups.

Sure they do, which is why maintaining tech supremacy is a national security matter of the US, and an issue Europe doesn't get, that the more you fall behind in mainstream tech products and services, the more you are at the mercy of the US (and China).

The fact that US companies own all the biggest cloud, social media and chat platforms, gives the US incredible leverage, that nobody else has.

[chpatrick]

The son of a KGB agent and oligarch is a British lord: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evgeny_Lebedev

[throw-ru-938]

There's probably no hard proof, but Russia is allegedly funding far-right movements like AfD and whatever Le Pen's party in France is now called. Also, see the career of Gerhard Schroeder, first German chancellor and then a top Gazprom official.

[com]

The FN or whatever it’s called loan from a little-known Russian bank sound pretty wild:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/a-rus...

[chpatrick]

The former chancellor of Germany Gerhard Schröder went to work for Gazprom afterwards: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerhard_Schr%C3%B6der

[dindobre]

Just by taking a look at EU politicians getting into russian companies (such as Gazprom) after their mandate should tell you a couple of things. Ever wondered how some countries became so dependent on russia?

[reducesuffering]

Putin spokesman’s daughter as assistant to French Member of European Parliament https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/02/25/daughter-putin-s...

[civilitty]

See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_and_Security_Co...

[suslik]

For example: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56280898 . She lives in Russia now.

[throwaway290]

Plenty of examples of corruption trickling out... Take Boris Johnson's granting peerage to some Russian not long ago. Corruption is a trojan horse in capitalism, money matters which is OK with honestly earned money but when money is obtained by exploitation/violence/theft it infects the system because ultra rich oligarchs can use money to get influence. Before 2014 west (UK is known for it) couldn't resist Russian dirty money much, now they are learning slowly but unfortunately there's crypto to work around sanctions etc.

[justinclift]

Properties in London? :)

[di456]

> Russian corruption doesn't generally touch Western governments - the atmosphere is too hostile to it.

Some recent parts of the government welcome the corruption.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/us-citizens-and-russian-intel...

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/16/us/politics/election-inte...

[ClumsyPilot]

> Russian corruption doesn't generally touch Western governments

Russia has an asset in British goverbment, in the hoise of lords!

Have you neber heard of Baron Lebedev, of Hampton in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames and of Siberia in the Russian Federation??

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evgeny_Lebedev

Current Government was taking political dotations from Russian oligarchs, officially, but somehow thos gets postes

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-58711151

[alwayslikethis]

I have a better way to frame this. A hostile country is less interested in low profile users and is not as able/willing to use the data it collects against the user. Committed tax evasion / breach of contract / fraud? Russia is much less likely to care than your own government.

[speed_spread]

You're framing it wrong. They _care_ very much. They even have a word for it!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kompromat

[the-printer]

For what it's worth, the examples given on that page are either domestic instances or do not, as your parent comment describes, involve low profile individuals.

[0xDEF]

>Russian corruption doesn't generally touch Western governments - the atmosphere is too hostile to it.

Brussels, Vienna, and many other European capitals are full of Russian "lobbyists".

[AlecSchueler]

But it's a fallacy to see the concern being about them having your individual data, right? The concern is the power of the information they yield when they have access to our collective data.

[gostsamo]

check how many western politicians went to work for gasprom or other russian government companies and talk again.

[blackpelican]

The UK is significantly influenced by Russia. Brexit is a prime, recent example, as well as the frequent donations from oligarchs to the Conservative party

[mayd]

Your claim that Russia influenced Brexit, which the Cameron-led Conservative government opposed, has been thoroughly debunked, as has the Trump-Russia collusion hoax in the US. Indeed, a certain Guardian "journalist", who promoted the Brexit-Russia influence hoax, lost a defamation case against her for falsely promoting it. The UK, which is currently governed by a Conservative party majority parliament, has also been, from the start, one of the most aggressive and dependable supporters of Ukraine in her struggle to resist the Russian invasion. So, I am wondering, to what kind of "significant influence" are you alluding?

[barbariangrunge]

I don’t know, you’ve never heard of blackmail? $500 in Bitcoin to some wallet or we leak your search results to your church group?

[suslik]

How would they connect search results to an individual? Surely, a simple VPN, which is a basic internet hygene these days, prevents that.

[ludwik]

That's what AOL thought when they released the anonymized search data of their users (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_search_log_release). Turns out they were very wrong.

[Toutouxc]

Many Jews got killed in the 40s because they'd registered themselves as Jews many years back, way before Hitler was a thing.

A lot of Ukrainians suddenly found themselves on Russian [claimed] soil and under Russian jurisdiction just a few months ago.

There are certain nations before which I'm not going to incriminate myself, out of precaution, Russia and China among them.

[slashdev]

If my country suddenly becomes Russian or China occupied territory, them having my search history is very far down my list of worries.

[oneshtein]

They may send killers just for you. For example, they are killing Holodomor researchers around the world (genocide of Ukrainians in 1932-1934: 25 millions were starved to death, 20 millions are recorded as Russian, millions were killed or executed).

[slashdev]

No, they won’t, because I’m nobody to them.

If you’re some kind of public enemy of Russia, maybe don’t use Russian services of any variety.

[oneshtein]

> No, they won’t, because I’m nobody to them.

I can tell you more about Holodomor.

[winrid]

Your character arc is just getting started :)

[justinclift]

> No, they won’t, because I’m nobody to them.

Maybe today. Who knows about the future though? :)

[konart]

>they are killing Holodomor researchers

Any examples?

[oneshtein]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gareth_Jones_(journalist)

https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9C%D0%B0%D0%BD%D1%8F%D0%BA...

https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A9%D1%83%D0%BA%D1%96%D0%BD...

[GaggiX]

The thing I found ridiculous about Google today is the image reverse search, unusable, but I have an extension to use the previous one before Google Lens was a thing.

[dessant]

The classic reverse image search results from Google will not be around for much longer, I've been getting reports about my browser extension no longer working with Google Images in some regions.

Yandex Images also possibly going away or becoming heavily censored is also an issue for journalists and researchers, since it is the best performing publicly available reverse image search engine.

[morkalork]

What, you don't like the reverse image product search? You want actual... images? Not thumbnails of stuff you can buy from rando websites? How anti-consumer of you!

[GaggiX]

The problem is that many times I get no results. Absolutely nothing.

[Alifatisk]

What’s the name of the extension? Didn’t know you could use the old Google images.

[dessant]

Maybe they were referring to my extension :), as of now you can still access the old search results.

https://github.com/dessant/search-by-image

[Alifatisk]

Cool, any plans on making it web based aswell?

[cod1r]

Yandex search is superior 100%. I use it too when I'm trying to reverse search for an image.

[chaosbolt]

>Do we want, at a time when Russia is considering the UK as an enemy, to be providing all our personal details to a server in Moscow?

(answering to the OP) Yes, there is nothing the Russians can do with my data that my government hasn't done.

>Depends how good the search is. Google doesn’t seem to want to provide me proper results anymore, even very basic image search tasks on google now net you only about 20 results all of which are wrong or useless. Yandex image search actually works.

Same, google is either doing this on purpose to then launch the "saving" LLM or they're just forgetting how to do it, google images is unusable and when it is everything is a .webp. And google search is a pay to win, you type "official python documentation" and the whole first page is full of geekforgeeks and other sponsored websited, and don't even get me started on facts/news where it just shamelessly turns into a propaganda machine.

Yandex is at least gives you 5 or 6 good results before it starts showing things in Russian.

[afavour]

> Yes, there is nothing the Russians can do with my data that my government hasn't done.

I understand anti-government sentiment but whenever I see a statement like this it makes me devalue anything that comes after it. You really think there is nothing a foreign government might do with your personal data that your government hasn't already done? You really feel like there's a similar level of accountability at stake?

[AnimalMuppet]

Given that they live in the US/UK and not in Russia, yes.

As I understand it, the claim is not that the US/UK are as evil as Russia, or even more or less morally equivalent. The claim is that the US/UK hoover up online information just like Russia (maybe even more), and that they are more exposed to what the US/UK governments do than they are to what Russia does.

Without minimizing the misdeeds of Russia, without resorting to (false) moral equivalence, it's still a defensible point. (Mind you, I'm not sure I agree with it. But it's defensible.)

[AlecSchueler]

Haven't we seen by now countless claims of the Russian government influencing western democracies through things like ad tech?

When millions of us give them our data these kinds of attacks become easier and easier.

[AnimalMuppet]

Fair point, and something that should be considered. Also, we're essentially giving them a free, large scale open source intelligence feed.

But the GRU isn't going to come to my door and arrest me because I searched on the wrong thing, even if I use Yandex. So in that sense, I'm insulated from what they know about me.

[speed_spread]

Unless you live in a shit hole, the worse that can happen is for your government to "just" jail you based on the information you provided. But if you provide that same info to enemy forces, they might use it to get leverage on you, getting you into even deeper shit than you already were. And they'll eventually dump you anyway and you'll be in a much worse situation.

[caeril]

There's also the important question of jurisdiction and closeness.

If I have to share my data with someone, I'd rather it be someone distant, and with limited capability. Sharing my data with Google is effectively the same thing as sharing my data with the FBI. And the FBI can stick guns in my face and lock me in a steel cage for anything they don't like in said data.

While I'm no fan of Putin, his regime can do precisely nothing actionable with my data, so long as I don't set foot in its territory.

[lampshades]

I use Yandex whenever I feel like Google is censoring something. Turns out I feel that way a lot.

[ric2b]

Is the feeling right more or less often than you expect?

[lampshades]

Originally it was right more often than I expected but now I have a pretty good sense that I'm usually right.

[skilled]

I challenge you to spend a day searching with Bing or DDG and then come back with the same opinion.