Russia-Ukraine war: DuckDuckGo to down-rank sites associated with Russian propaganda

After Russia's invasion of Ukraine, major technology companies in the world have stood by Ukraine, banning the sales of their products and halting their services in Russia. Most recently, the search engine called DuckDuckGo has rolled out a couple of updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation. DuckDuckGo has joined other giants such as Apple, Google, Meta and Microsoft. Keep reading to know more about how a search engine has responded to the current scenario of the Russia Ukraine war. 

CEO and co-founder of DuckDuckGo, Gabriel Weinberg announced the update on March 10, 2022. As a part of the update, the search engine will purposefully down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation. This means that the search engine will show minimal to no results that originate from Russia - it could be websites, blogs, news articles and more. Other companies such as Google and YouTube have taken similar measures to limit the reach of Russian media's content. 

Additionally, Weinberg also mentions that the search engine often places news modules and other information boxes at the top of DuckDuckGo search results. Further, the company clarifies that its mission is to make simple privacy protections accessible to all. Weinberg mentions in his tweet that "privacy is a human right and transcends politics, which is why about 100 million people around the world use DuckDuckGo."

Russia to ban Instagram from March 14

It has been more than two weeks since the Russia-Ukraine war began and both sides have dealt with heavy damage. However, during the course of invading Ukraine, Russia has faced a lot of sanctions from governments around the world, which was later reflected in decisions made by some of the biggest technology companies in the world. While most companies like Apple, Samsung, Google and Meta have stopped selling their products or providing their services in Russia, Russian regulators have decided to block Instagram in the country. 

In its latest move, Russia has decided to restrict its citizen to connect with the rest of the world via the popular social media platform Instagram. The Russian regulator Roskomnadzor has recently said in a statement that it will restrict access to Meta-owned Instagram from March 14, 2022. The update comes one day after both Facebook and Instagram made a small change in their current policy and allowed for posts with violent speeches against Russian soldiers and politicians. 

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