Duck Duck Go, a privacy-focused web browser with a variety of built-in security features, released a desktop browser for Windows.
The desktop app aims at providing users with a better browsing experience, claiming to use as little as 60% fewer resources than Chrome. It actively blocks trackers, targeted advertising, profiling, and search query logging. All this in turn lets it use fewer resources while giving you great browsing security.
Its other features include:
- Smart encryption. Upgrades users to HTTML automatically, which ensures their connection to websites is safe.
- Email Protection. Uses Duck Duck Go’s native Email Protection service to remove trackers and advertising before it reaches the user’s inbox, making it harder to be subject to phishing scams.
- Tracker blocking. Remove all third-party trackers using DuckDuckGo’s privacy-threatening tracker list
- Duck player. Duck Duck Go uses its own media player to let you watch videos on YouTube without being tracked. It also blocks ads.
- “Fire.” A one-button approach to removing all search history and saved session information.
- Cookie pop-up management. Hides pop-ups requesting that users let the website add cookies, which can be a huge privacy invasion.
- Password manager. Handles your passwords for you while keeping them encrypted. Also includes auto-fill capabilities.
“DuckDuckGo for Windows is already equipped with nearly all the privacy protections and everyday features that users know and trust from our iOS, Mac, and Android browsers — and it’s getting closer to parity with those browsers every day,” Duck Duck Go said in its announcement.
The product is still in its beta version, however, so not every feature has been added yet. Duck Duck Go has said it’s still working on implementing extension compatibility, as of now it does not support extensions. Since it’s in beta as well, expect some bugs or compatibility issues while they iron its features out.