A German consumer rights' organisation is warning against agreeing too quickly to Google's new privacy conditions, which have been popping up on the search engine of late, requiring a click on the "I agree" button before a search can start.
Never fear says the Consumer Agency of North Rhine Westphalia (VZNRW) - where analysts say some of the stipulations in the Google agreement "make their hair stand on end."
There are ways to use the search giant without allowing it track a user's interest in kinky or politically inopportune topics.
It's best to hide behind other services which make use of Google Search, but do not store the user's search history, says the VZNRW.
Services which send the information requests on to Google include Startpage or Ixquick, both based in the Netherlands. Startpage offers a kind of anonymous access to Google. Ixquick synthesizes from a variety of search engines to pull together its own list of results.
Neither notes the user's IP address, nor sends search requests or other information to third parties.
Other options include DuckDuckGo from the United States, MetaGer from Germany and Qwant from France, which all advertise strict respect for privacy, but use their own search technologies.
Most work just like Google, though the results come up differently, with their priority sorted using different technologies.