Qwant is also a good alternative to google.

 

Why do you guys keep on suggesting alternatives to Google when we fixed his source of problems (VPN)?

There's no alternative to Google, still as of today, any competitor is way far behind. And for a reason: it's a winner-takes-all business. It's one of the world's most valuable (and valued) companies and it's here to stay for another century (at least).

 

It's because of the number of requests coming from a single IP address since you are using a VPN and I'm sure many people are connected to the same server as you, so it asks you for a captcha for security reasons.
Solution:
Use a not-so-popular VPN.
Use another search engine.

 

Exactly.

Use Mullvad. Google. And Brave. Sorted.

 

-

 

Last edited by a moderator: Feb 28, 2023

Startpage use Googles Engine:
https://support.startpage.com/hc/en...he-relationship-between-Startpage-and-Google-

 

Do you mean Brave Search? Or Brave Browser?
Because I'm currently using Firefox with Google Search.

 

Yes!

 

Brave Browser (with Google search) instead of Firefox, it's even faster. And Mullvad VPN if you need a VPN (forget built-in browser VPNs with cheap overused IP addresses, causing the captchas).

 

qwant is a corrupt company that uses google's algos while pretending to be clean. Millions of public money spent on European crap.

 

source?

as far as I read, tbey use BING :
https://about.qwant.com/en/legal/confidentialite/

compare US laws to european regarding privacy...

 

It's the VPN. End of story. Happens with all of them. I'm on Mullvad which is currently probably the best of them, and it happens now and then anyway. The current state of VPN's is that they'll guaranty anonymizing your actual location, but they can no longer promise you the site you're visiting won't know you're on a VPN, or that they won't be able to tell you're not actually in the location your VPN server is transmitting from. If you expect more than that you'll likely be disappointed.

I'm on Mullvad for about 9 months now. I agree with you that it's probably the best you can find at this point in time. It's a couple of dollars more a month than others, but IMO it's worth the small extra cost for the best possible security and anonymity you're likely to get nowadays.

However, I don't agree with you that it will resolve all problems the OP was posting about or that it can be called 'perfection'. While on their VPN servers I will at times get a captcha request; the site you're going to (Google in the OP's example) will get a zillion requests from the same VPN server IP and they know something is up. There are many sites that won't allow access at all when I'm on a Mullvad server -- those sites can see you're on a VPN. It's not been uncommon for me to check a Mullvad IP address on whatismyipaddress.com, where it'll show you one location for your VPN IP, and then a totally different country location for your ISP! When a site sees a New Jersey, U.S. IP location and an ISP located somewhere in Europe, trust me, they can figure out you're on a VPN. Does Mullvad make some junk service like Surfshark look like crap?? You bet! I used to use Surfshark and for the 2-3 dollars a month more Mullvad is a no-brainer if you can spare the few extra dollars. But I wouldn't try to sell it to anyone as having arrived in VPN nirvana. Also, since The New York Times cited Mullvad as the best of the VPN's, their subscriptions are way up and you can expect the sort of service issues I've noted above will likely worsen a bit because of it.

So, while I agree with @spncart that Mullvad is top notch based on what is currently available in the VPN subscription market, I do not agree with the idea that it's the solution to all problems.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Feb 5, 2023

Well you made a point here and since you've been on Mullvad for longer than me I won't dispute it. That said, I haven't had a single instance of encountering issues, captchas with Mullvad since I started using it, that is, since early January. Precisely, I also always check whatismyipaddress.com and other IP/ISP check tools indeed to make sure any VPN is working as it should, especially before I proceed to like logging in on administration websites such as claiming unemployment benefits while on holiday from another country and such things ^^ and trust me Mullvad has never failed me (unlike the other mainstream VPNs like Nord, Express, Proton and the ones CyberGhost and Surfshark you mentioned, that are pieces of trash and servers indeed).

So the reason why you might still encounter captchas (surprising to me) might be down to other factors such as your internet connection, surfing habits or browser plugins (and many more factors). For the record I've only been using 2/3 servers (always the same ones I need for basic use, in Switzerland) out of the 900 Mullvad offers. And that are broken down here as either OpenVPN or WireGuard (I go for the latter).

https://mullvad.net/en/servers/

I didn't wait for the NY Times to put Mullvad on the top of my list already about a year ago (I was just too lazy to make the switch and pay for it) considering Reddit was all over it (which for me is a more credible source than newspapers half-paid articles on 'benchmarking' VPNs week in week out by the way) mainly due to the privacy and cash/monero things, not so much was talked about the performance. I had to start using myself to confirm my intuition that it was also better engineered vs. mainstream competitors and using better technology and servers. Mullvad is still pretty confidential among internet users, ask anyone around you, they won't know it. But they will know the mainstream brands. That's because they decided not to spend tens of thousand in spamming ads.

Lastly, it's not even so much more expensive if you consider that the competitors always offer ridiculous packages locking you up for 24 months (typical black friday bs). It's even cheaper than most if you compare on the basis of monthly fees (except perhaps the cheapest crap like Cyber and Surfshark they really have the lowest package and quality for like 60 a year with 24 months plan - but yeah there's no point in spending so little a month for a service that will do a poor job and leave the user frustrated). I think then it comes to VPNs really there's no way around it, too low of a price will inevitably lead to an unreliable product.

Mullvad: 5 a month, 60 a year (100% flexibility)
Express: 13 a month, 100 a year (with 12 month plan)
Nord: 12-15 a month, 5-8 a month (with 12 month plan), 4-6 a month (with 24 months plan)
CyberCrap: 13 a month, 7 a month (with 6 month), 60-100 for 2 years + 2/4 months special offer (depends on the offers and time of the year)
Etc.

 

Last edited: Feb 5, 2023

I stopped using g00gle a long long time ago because:
1- They track you everywhere and everytime.
2- They hide a lot of results of your search with shadow banning. (for copyright most of the cases)
3- They work along side with "them".
4- They show you they want you to see/watch.

I'm not communist but I use Yan.dex, there is no shadow banning and they have a better image search engine.

 

Hmm haven't tried Mullvad but I have tried AirVPN. In my experience It was too slow most of the time. I stuck with it for a year. I tried everything with their technical team and nothing would help. The free VPNs I've tried are blazing fast in comparison.

Maybe I'll give Mullvad a go.

As for Google, I use it sometimes but for whatever reason it hasn't been able to pinpoint my location in so many years. It gets the state right, but the cities are always changing. So far it hasn't detected mine. Strange.

 

@spncart --

In terms of pricing, you're comparing the standard pricing for several VPN services with Mullvad. I've had subs with Cyberghost, Surfshark, and ExpressVPN. Several times a year, most holidays or Black Friday, those VPN's run heavily discounted sales on subs (like 70% off!) and the sales last for weeks at a time. All my subs were picked up on those discounts, which I believe is the case with the majority of their subscribers. With Cyberghost and Surfshark they were both 2 dollars and change a month with a 1 year or 2 year subscription. ExpressVPN was more like 3 dollars and change/month. Mullvad is always 5 Euro/month (no sales or discount programs) or in USD it is currently 5 dollars and change. So, as I originally pointed out, Mullvad winds up costing 2 or 3 dollars more a month. Honestly, I've never met anyone who subscribed to those services at the regular prices you're posting. I'm sure it happens now and then, but most people wind up picking up the year or more subscriptions when the service goes on holiday sales.

The New York Times thing I mentioned was thru their "Wirecutter" column, which is pretty legit and well-respected, and specializes in product reviews and recommendations. They don't get paid off for their articles, but like all websites I do believe they get referral fees if you purchase a product that's linked in one of their reviews. That doesn't phase me with them since they generally will mention (with links) numerous competing products in their reviews and so they'd get that referral fee regardless of which VPN you wind up choosing from one of their columns. I'd have to go back and look, but I vaguely remember when they wrote up Mullvad they compared with services from 4 other VPN's, all of which had referral links listed in their column.

Finally, as for the captcha thing, like you said, you've only been using Mullvad for a few weeks. I have no doubt a lot of that depends upon which server you happen to land on. I must have tried 100 of their servers by now, and on some you'll run into captcha problems or a site denying you access altogether, with others it works fine. I recently had some sample site that was linked on sister site which wouldn't allow me access to their page while on the Mullvad VPN. Go figure! I think a big part of that is the Mullvad servers that use an Internet Service Provider based in Europe for IP addresses that are based in the U.S. The problem with that is to know that's going on you'd have to start checking each server on whatismyip which would be kind of a pain. P.S. My internet connection is rock-solid (FIOS), I use Brave since it came out, and have only 2 add-ons in the browser, neither of which has ever caused me a problem with anything.

Anyway, I think we've gotten far off from the original post here, maybe let's drop it before Mr. Moon starts removing comments

 

Yandex is blocked in my country.
This search engine belongs to Russia, as well as their special services.
About the picture search engine, I agree, it is better than Google and all the others. I use the VPN only for the picture search engine, but never instead of a search engine.

 

https://you.com/
what about this site?
AI Search Engine with Chat

 

https://www.nextinpact.com/recherche;q=qwant (translate it)
I'm french and i can tell that all our data is going back to USA not to USSR. We are but a colony of the empire of good and of God.

 

1. Like I said, I also tried all the VPNs you tried, and I prefer to stick to Mullvad's steady 5 eur a month not only because it is overall better in my experience (that is, never going through issues, unlike the others) and because 5 eur a month is nothing for me (like a cup of coffee where I live). The very fact that people need to chase these 'deals' tell more about the fact the these crappy services fight each on price only, not quality.

2. No one reads the New York Times anymore. I wouldn't call a minor citation in this newspaper a breakthrough lol. So I researched it and it happened back in July 2020. But it's not like since then Mullvad use exploded, it got a better exposure in the small niche/reddit community, yes, but that's about it. I haven't met anyone even with a prime interest for technology that even knows the name Mullvad (maybe that will change in the future).

3. https://mullvad.net/en/help/server-list/

Improved performance through collaboration

We work closely with 31173 Services who hosts a number of our owned servers. With these servers we actively invest time on network performance and connectivity. For example, we’ve established fiber wavelengths between Amsterdam and Frankfurt, London, Paris, Malmö, and Zurich in order to improve performance and reduce latency. Doing so also ensures that users' traffic can travel as far as possible within 31173’s network without using other network providers.

Yeah I guess since I only use Zürich it's not like I tried 100s of servers like you, which indeed would have potentially exposed me to problems. Gottcha.