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How to change the default search engine in Microsoft Edge
Don't settle with Bing! Use Google on Microsoft Edge
Google Chrome might be the default browser for many. However, Microsoft Edge is becoming a popular alternative. It packs features like Collections, Bing Chat integration, Vertical tabs, Sleeping tabs, Bing Image Creator, and more. You can access it from Android devices, iPhones, desktop PCs, laptops, and budget Chromebooks.
How to turn off Google SafeSearch and other search filters
You may not want to see everything that pops up when you disable SafeSearch
The internet makes finding any information you need easy, but you may stumble upon explicit content. This content can lead to awkward situations at work or in public. Moreover, such content is unsuitable for children. That's where the search engine's built-in SafeSearch option comes in. It filters out potentially inappropriate content.
What is Google RankBrain?
RankBrain is a Google AI made to improve search results: Here's what's going on every time you search with Google
When you pull out your phone and type in a quick Google search to answer a question, what's really going on? Most of us know that there's some vast Google algorithm behind the scenes that interprets organic search and posts results via a specific ranking. So far, so good. But Google also included a significant amount of AI technology in its search engine, bringing us to RankBrain. RankBrain is a machine learning model that's deeply involved in how Google search results are returned, which means it impacts many of our online lives. Here's an overview of how it all works.
What is Google's BERT language model?
Learn more about Google's BERT language model, how this breakthrough AI works, what does, and how it's different from Google Bard
BERT is an AI language model Google developed before Bard. It serves a different purpose and was operational years before OpenAI launched ChatGPT. Google is a leader in artificial intelligence, building AI into Android, Nest smart speakers, and more. Every time you access Google Assistant, that's an AI answering.
What is an algorithm, exactly?
What is an algorithm, and how does it work? These processes are all around us. Let's take a closer look at them
The word "algorithm" is ubiquitous these days. However, like many tech terms that get thrown around, its meaning isn't always clear to casual audiences. Since it seems like algorithms are everywhere and doing everything, many people have grown confused about what this software does. Are you using algorithms every time you pull out your Android phone? Almost certainly.
Microsoft Bing Rewards will pay your for searching the web. Here's how it works
Make money while giving Google the side-eye
When doing a quick search for a query, you whip out your top-of-the-line 5G phone, launch your browser, and type the question. And you get the answer pretty much instantly. While you don't pay much attention to it, a search engine behind the scenes pulls up the results you see and in the order they're arranged.
Here's the one desktop Chrome feature I wish Google would bring to mobile
This time-saving feature would be more than welcome on mobile
I'm a big fan of time-saving features on my computing devices. Keyboard shortcuts, text expansion snippets, clipboard managers, my keyboard-fu arsenal is full of tips and tricks that reduce the grunt of my daily tasks. After all, the less time I spend doing basic chores, the more time I have to focus on interesting ones, like writing articles or assisting my colleagues. But the all-time most awesomest bestest feature among these tricks is custom search engines on Chrome. I use them daily, all the time, and I've sung their praises enough times that I've made a few converts. What baffles me, though, is that the Chrome team has been busy adding more complicated and powerful features to Android, but it has yet to implement this very old and simple one.
11 tips to become a Chrome custom search engine jedi
The ultimate guide to quickly find anything on the web
When it comes to custom search engines on Chrome, I don't joke, I don't play, I don't mess around. It is a Very Serious Topic™ that comes up countless times in our internal Android Police discussions, more often than not when I figure out yet another useful engine that can shave off precious seconds from our daily workflows. That's usually followed by a ten-minute chat about how clever that latest trick is and how I should write a book about custom search engines. Well, short of writing a long book then trying to find a publisher, here is a guide with all the tips, tricks, and smart ideas I've amassed over the last decade. This is the breadth of my knowledge and I have chosen to bestow it upon you, so please, treat it with the utmost respect.
The majority of us turn to Google Search to discover all kinds of web content, but that might not be the best choice if you care about privacy. In order to improve its results and make more relevant recommendations, Google tracks your activity across the web. If you're looking for a privacy-focussed alternative, we have good news — Brave Search is here to offer another option.
The Brave Browser people bought a search engine
Brave Search will focus on privacy and openness, with a paid ad-free option
Brave, the desktop and mobile browser based on Chromium code, is gaining a lot of steam. Its stated mission of protecting privacy and blocking malicious advertising resonates with a lot of users, particularly those who are growing weary of Google's track record on both. Brave's latest move is an acquisition of Tailcat, a small open source search engine out of Europe.
DuckDuckGo coming back online in India following country-wide block
The ban might have been accidental fallout from the Chinese app block
Read update
Following the Indian ban of almost 60 Chinese apps including TikTok and Weibo, many people living in the country now report not being able to access the privacy-centric search engine DuckDuckGo. The company confirms as much, saying that the problem isn't on its end. It's currently talking to local internet service providers to resolve the issue. It looks like these have blocked the service via their DNS servers, as the search engine is still accessible through most third-party DNS resolvers.
Back in 2010, Hipmunk launched with the promise to simplify and improve flight search across multiple airlines and released an Android app soon after. Its innovations have long been copied by other search engines including Google, which made it hard for the company to keep up. It was acquired by SAP Concur in 2016, and Hipmunk has announced today that it will shut down for good on January 23. The business-focused Concur Hipmunk service is also retiring.
Following the EU's record antitrust ruling against Google back in 2018, the European Commission asked the company to give Android users the option to set other search engines as default. That prompted Google to take the opportunity to make even more money by auctioning which companies to feature as default search engine providers. The winners have now been published, and it looks like privacy advocate DuckDuckGo and meta search engine Info.com have taken the crown across the continent.
Google's ongoing European saga just saw a new development. After the record $5 billion antitrust fine issued by the European Commission last year, the company had to implement new screens to ask users if they wanted additional browsers and search engines on their devices, and now it's taking that one step further by making the search engine choice a default. However, as would any for-profit company do, it's using this as an opportunity to charge search providers that want to be featured.
Google has thousands of custom-built servers that scan the web every single second for new content... except right now. Google stopped indexing new webpages a few hours ago, but the company says a fix is on the way.
Google has been facing a lot of backlash from the EU (and other countries) regarding its dominance over several markets, including online search. "Backlash" is a tame word to describe it too, there have been lawsuits, huge fines in numbers we can't fully comprehend, and lots of politics at stake. But whether this latest change in Chrome's search engines is related to that or not, we'll let you decide.
News of Google's censored Chinese search engine project Dragonfly has steadily leaked since August, angering many of the company's own employees - especially after the response that filtered down from the higher-ups was essentially: yes, we might compromise core values for business. A group of over 170 employees have now banded together to address the issue publicly with an article and petition posted on Medium in partnership with Amnesty International entitled "We are Google employees. Google must drop Dragonfly."
For search engines, there's nothing more lucrative than being the default provider on a popular web browser. In the past, companies have paid massive amounts of money for the position; Yahoo gave Mozilla over $300 million to be the default engine for Firefox, but the company was later outbid by Google. A new report estimates that Google's place as the default iPhone search engine is costing the company $9 billion this year.
As Google so aptly states, we often pose nuanced, and sometimes ambiguous, questions to our favorite search engines. While we as humans often understand such questions in context, especially if we know each other well, search engines are not that smart or aware. Google is hoping to address that with the addition of its new multi-faceted featured search snippets.
If you prefer that your internet searches not be subject to the all-seeing eye in Mountain View, the privacy-focused DuckDuckGo search engine has got you covered (almost literally). Now with a souped-up browser extension and mobile app, DuckDuckGo is expanding its blanket of privacy across the entire web.