Duckduckgo
Verified“US-controlled, US-hosted, Bing-powered. Privacy isn't sovereignty.”
- Ownership
- Private, US-controlled
- Scale
- ~3% US search share
- Revenue
- $100M+ (USD)
- Employees
- ~335
15 = midpoint of Control 14 & Data 16
Sovereignty Quadrant
Control ↑ who owns & governs the company · Data → where your data lives. Every dot is a company — click to open it.
Every number below traces to 12 sourced facts across 9 independent sources, last verified 2026-06-12. 3 open questions hold confidence at 82% — they lower confidence, never the score.
Control ↑
Who legally and economically controls the company
Legal & Jurisdiction
12
Incorporated in Delaware and operated from Pennsylvania, fully within US jurisdiction (CLOUD Act, FISA, NSLs). No EU operating entity — only a German media-law service agent.
Why 12? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
The legal entity is Duck Duck Go, Inc., a Delaware-registered corporation headquartered at 20 Paoli Pike, Paoli, Pennsylvania.
DuckDuckGo Imprint & Transparency · as of 2026-06-12
As a US company DuckDuckGo is subject to US legal-process powers including the CLOUD Act, FISA and National Security Letters.
Proton — Is DuckDuckGo safe? · as of 2025
DuckDuckGo's only EU-facing legal presence is a German service agent (law firm Gleiss Lutz, Berlin) designated under the German Media State Treaty (MStV), not an operating subsidiary.
DuckDuckGo Imprint & Transparency · as of 2026-06-12
Control & Ownership
15
Privately held and US-controlled: founder/CEO Gabriel Weinberg retains control; outside investors are US and Canadian. No EU voting or economic stake, no EU listing.
Why 15? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
DuckDuckGo is a privately held company founded and led by Gabriel Weinberg, who serves as both founder and CEO.
Wikipedia — DuckDuckGo · as of 2026
DuckDuckGo has raised roughly $172M; lead institutional investors are Union Square Ventures (US) and OMERS Ventures (Canada).
Tracxn — DuckDuckGo funding · as of 2024
A 2020 secondary round added investors including WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton and Tim Berners-Lee; no EU-based controlling shareholder is reported.
TechCrunch — USV invests in DuckDuckGo · as of 2021
Data →
Where your data lives and who can reach it
Data & Infrastructure
12
Runs on Amazon AWS (a US hyperscaler) and sources core web results from Microsoft Bing. No EU-owned infrastructure; data sits with US providers under US jurisdiction.
Why 12? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
DuckDuckGo's components, including all front-end, run on Amazon AWS (EC2), historically across AWS regions in California, Virginia, Singapore and Ireland.
High Scalability — DuckDuckGo Architecture · as of 2013
DuckDuckGo confirms its traditional web links and images are 'largely sourced from Bing', Microsoft's index.
DuckDuckGo Help — Sources · as of 2026-06-12
A Microsoft search-syndication contract obliged DuckDuckGo's browser to permit Microsoft tracking scripts until a 2022 public backlash forced a change — showing contractual dependence on a US partner.
TechCrunch — DuckDuckGo Microsoft tracking scripts · as of 2022-08-05
Operations & People
22
US-headquartered, US founder/CEO, USD-denominated, ~335 staff. Workforce is distributed/remote but the company is US-centered with no EU operational base.
Why 22? 3 sourced facts · click to expand
DuckDuckGo is headquartered in Paoli, Pennsylvania, USA.
Wikipedia — DuckDuckGo · as of 2026
DuckDuckGo has been profitable since 2014 with annual revenue reported above $100M, denominated in US dollars.
Forge Global — DuckDuckGo IPO profile · as of 2023
Aligned to the EU Commission’s official Cloud Sovereignty Framework (SEAL, Jun 2026) →
What we don’t know
3 open questions — they lower confidence, never the score
- ?
What is DuckDuckGo's current (2026) cloud topology — is it still all-AWS, and does any user-facing data sit in EU AWS regions?
If core search infra moved to EU-region or non-US providers, the infra score would rise modestly; current public data points to AWS (US provider) regardless of region.
- ?
What share of DuckDuckGo web results now comes from its own DuckDuckBot crawler versus Bing?
Greater independence from Bing would slightly reduce its Microsoft dependency, but the index is still US-supplied.
- ?
Exact current equity split and whether any single investor or the founder holds majority voting control.
Affects precision of the ownership score, though all known holders are US/Canada, so the EU-sovereignty conclusion is unchanged.
EU Cloud Sovereignty Framework lens
The EU Cloud Sovereignty Framework (SEAL) is designed to certify cloud service providers, not search engines; the rows below are an analogous mapping for orientation only, not a real certification.
Strategic
US-owned, US-led company dependent on a US search partner (Microsoft); no EU strategic autonomy.
Legal & jurisdictional
Delaware-incorporated, US-operated; exposed to CLOUD Act / FISA. Only a German media-law service agent in the EU.
Data & AI
Strong no-tracking data-minimization protects users, but underlying data and AI features ride on US providers (AWS, Bing, third-party LLMs).
Operational
US HQ, US founder/CEO, USD reporting; remote workforce is US-centered with no EU operational hub.
Supply chain
Core search index syndicated from Microsoft Bing; hosting from Amazon AWS — both US suppliers.
Technological
No independent Google-scale index; depends on Bing for web coverage and AWS for compute.
Security & compliance
Publishes privacy policy, GDPR-style SCCs/DPAs and a transparency/imprint page, but compliance posture sits under US law.
Environmental sustainability
No DuckDuckGo-specific, primary-sourced sustainability or energy disclosure was found.
EU alternatives
French privacy search engine with its own crawler ambitions, but historically also leaned on Bing for results — verify current index independence.
German B-Corp search engine (EU-owned, steward-owned), but web results are sourced from Google/Bing, so infra independence is limited.
Dutch privacy search with EU/GDPR jurisdiction, but proxies Google results and took investment from US ad-tech firm System1 — ownership caveat.
How the method works
Methodology v2 (provisional): the score is the midpoint of two axes — Control (who owns and governs the company) and Data (where your data lives and who can reach it). Each axis is scored only on verified evidence; unknowns reduce confidence, never the score. Every input below is sourced; the weights and judgments are open to challenge.
Spotted an error? Every claim is sourced — challenge it and we correct the record.
- 2026-06-12 — Initial golden profile, authored from primary sources (human + AI review).
Report Incorrect Data
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Verified 2026-06-12 · Human + AI joint review (sources independently checked) · Methodology