DuckDuckGo down in India: Private browser mysteriously stops working

The error can be bypassed by users changing their DNS server

DuckDuckGo is popular among privacy advocates as it does not collect user data (CC)

Privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo has reported that its service is not working in India.

“To our users in India: We’ve received many reports our search engine is unreachable by much of India right now and have confirmed it is not due to us,” the company tweeted.

“We're actively talking to Internet providers to get to the bottom of it ASAP. Thank you for your patience.”

It is unclear why DuckDuckGo would be unavailable in the country. It remains online in other countries, including the United Kingdom.

In India, the government is more censorious than their equivalents in other countries. At the end of last year there were protests over a citizenship law, which saw authorities shutting down the internet where demonstrators were located.

In 2019, the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, shut down the internet 95 times.

During the same year, the Indian government proposed rules that would force technology companies including to remove posts at the behest of the government.

Internet companies would also be required to build screening tools to block Indians from seeing “unlawful information or content,” as well as weakening protections in encrypted messaging services like WhatsApp could be accessed by authorities.

Such censorship may be a reason why Indian people would prefer to use DuckDuckGo, which offers greater privacy than other search engines such as Google.

Users can, however, bypass the DuckDuckGo fault by switching to a third-party DNS provider.

“DNS” stands for Domain Name System and is the equivalent of the phone book of the internet.

DNS translates domain names to IP addresses, which allows browsers to reach websites.

On Android, this can be done via these steps:

• Go to Settings, selecting Network & internet, then Advanced, then Private DNS.
• Select the Private DNS provider hostname option.
• Enter one.one.one.one or 1dot1dot1dot1.cloudflare-dns.com and hit Save.
• Visit 1.1.1.1/help to verify the DNS server is enabled.

For iPhone and iPad users, the change can be made using these steps:

• Go to Settings, then Wi-Fi. Tap the “i” icon next to the name of the network, and scroll down to “Configure DNS”
• Change the setting from Automatic to Manual. Then tap the red minus button next to the DNS servers followed by the Delete button.
• Tap “Add Server” and, in the empty listing, enter the DNS server IP address you wish to use, such as 1.1.1.1. or 1.0.0.1.

The DNS server 1.1.1.1 or 1.0.0.1 is used by Cloudflare to provide greater security information.

The details are complex, but more information can be found on the company’s website.