Simple and seamless privacy protection for your browser.
Simple and seamless privacy protection for your browser.
Tired of being tracked online? We can help. At DuckDuckGo, we believe online privacy should be simple. That's why our extension has one single purpose — better protecting your privacy in Chrome.
With the press of a button, you get seamless protection from most 3rd-party trackers while you search and browse, access to tracking protection when receiving email, and much more. Together these privacy essentials make more privacy your default.
FEATURE HIGHLIGHTS:
• Search with DuckDuckGo by Default — install, and we'll set your default search engine and homepage to DuckDuckGo Search so you can start your Internet searches without being tracked.
• Escape Online Tracking — block most hidden 3rd-party trackers found lurking on websites you visit by preventing tracking scripts from loading. This is an effective way to keep companies behind these trackers from collecting and selling your data. See notes and links below for more information.
• Enforce Encryption — force many sites you visit to use an encrypted (HTTPS) connection where available, protecting your data from prying eyes.
• Block Email Trackers (Beta) — 70% of emails track you as soon as you open them. Enabling our Email Protection is the easy way to block most email trackers and hide your address without switching email services. Join the private waitlist for the free beta version through our mobile app settings menu.
• Signal Your Privacy Preference with GPC — built into the app, Global Privacy Control (GPC) intends to help you express your opt-out rights automatically by telling websites not to sell or share your personal information. Whether it can be used to enforce your legal rights (for example, current or future CCPA, GDPR requirements) depends on the laws in your jurisdiction.
PLUS EVEN MORE PROTECTION FROM:
• Fingerprinting — helps stop companies from trying to combine specific information about your browser and device settings to create a unique identifier for you that they can use to follow you around the web.
• Chrome’s New Tracking Tech: stop Google from using your browser to collect and auction off your personal data with their latest advertising trackers and targeting (FLEDGE and Topics).
• Link Tracking — helps stop websites from gathering your browsing history and personal identifiers from links you click on.
• Social Trackers — block a lot of embedded social content around the web so companies like Facebook can't track you through their videos, posts, and comments found on other sites. You can easily unblock to view them if desired.
• Google AMP — force sites to load content directly from publishers instead of using Google-owned links, which are full of creepy trackers.
• Unexpected Cookies — prevent most 3rd-party cookies from tracking you as you browse from site to site.
That's how DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials delivers on our single-purpose promise to provide seamless privacy protection in Chrome. It’s privacy, simplified.
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Note about our tracker blocking for 3rd-party sites and emails:
DuckDuckGo never tracks you. When you leave our search engine to use other sites, we aim to block as many hidden trackers as possible, but we can't block them all for a few reasons. New trackers emerge all the time, so first we need to find them. Then, blocking these trackers can sometimes break functionality, so we need to develop new approaches without hurting usability. Additionally, in our extension we offer a specific type of protection that stops scripts from even loading on 3rd-party sites, which isn’t offered on most popular browsers by default. Currently, this one loading protection doesn't apply to Microsoft scripts on 3rd-party sites due to contractual restrictions. However, our other tracker blocking methods (like 3rd-party cookie blocking) are unrestricted and continue to work against these trackers to protect your privacy online.
To be the most privacy-protected you can be in Chrome, we also suggest tweaking your Chrome settings that are not controllable by extensions,
• In Chrome Privacy Sandbox settings, disable Privacy Sandbox trial https://lifehacker.com/how-to-disable-google-chromes-new-privacy-sandbox-track-1847276073 ;
• Sign out of Chrome https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/9159867?hl=en&ref_topic=7439538;
• Turn off Chrome sign-in https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/9159867?hl=en&ref_topic=7439538;
• Don't sync your history data with Chrome https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/185277;
• In Google Activity Controls, disable “Web & App Activity” https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/185277;
• In Google Ad Settings, disable “Ad Personalization” https://adssettings.google.com/
MORE ABOUT OUR TECHNOLOGY:
• Tracker Radar: https://spreadprivacy.com/duckduckgo-tracker-radar/
• Smarter Encryption: https://spreadprivacy.com/duckduckgo-smarter-encryption/
• GPC: https://spreadprivacy.com/announcing-global-privacy-control/
• FLEDGE/Topics Blocking: https://spreadprivacy.com/topics-and-fledge-blocked/
Looking for our Mac browsing app? You can sign up for the private waitlist in the settings of the Android or iOS apps. Learn More: https://spreadprivacy.com/introducing-duckduckgo-for-mac/
Please note that tracker blocking requires certain permissions, but these permissions work solely on your local device. We do not save or share your search or browsing information ourselves, as per our strict privacy policy: https://duckduckgo.com/privacy/
MORE ABOUT DUCKDUCKGO:
• About Us: https://duckduckgo.com/about/
• Privacy Newsletter: https://duckduckgo.com/newsletter
• Privacy Policy: https://duckduckgo.com/privacy/
• Open Source Code: https://github.com/duckduckgo/duckduckgo-privacy-extension
If you just want to use DuckDuckGo Search as your default search engine in Google Chrome, you do not need this extension and can follow these install instructions instead: https://duckduckgo.com/install. However, we strongly recommend you use it in addition to more fully protect your privacy in Chrome.
