I totally get it I could definitely bypass the ads. However the point is that they are doing it at all. I dont want to use their service if this is going to be their strategy.
I have a vero-V but honestly the apps are lack luster. Its amazing if you have your own library of content. I saw my first homescreen add on roku yesterday. I am pissed.
Its a lot of work but you have to constantly push. I am 42, but I read a few dozen books a year, I'm constantly learning new languages, new instruments, I write short stories for fun, do creative projects, and meditate. I still feel really sharp but I'm throwing down everyday.
Not really necessary people make DNS requests which are pretty easy to track if you know what URL was requested that will be the exact product. This can all be done by man in the middle and monitoring network traffic. But even that is sort of unnecessary. They could very possibly have contracts with ISPs or other network operators some of that is likely just secret and they dont disclose it.
Likely every product any amazon customer ever views. They could potentially even figure out which things you buy. But you can get a pretty clear picture of someone's personality and interests if you know everything they search for.
They do it all to build up a huge web of interconnected data points. Duckduckgo itself they might take as evidence that someone is trying to hide something. Then the government goes to a FISA court and gets permission to have other tech companies hand over all your data. Its not any one site its the picture that can be gleamed from all the data available across all the sites.
Duckduckgo is not the problem. They are using publicly scrapable information. So for instance if they have fingerprinted your device they see you go to duckduckgo, then they see you access a site about buying guns, it becomes trivial to determine what you searched for. They would not have direct access to what you search on duckduckgo and duckduckgo is not giving them access. They are using various methods to collect data based on habits. You can use literally any service you want and they could do the same thing.
Probably just whatever the public metadata is. metadata is super powerful especially if you have a lot of it. if the email was protonmail to protonmail they will get nothing. If it's gmail to protonmail they will know that user X is talking to User Y in gmail. They will also have the email header information which is basically just going to be clear text. so they can still ascertain who you know, who you are talking about, and maybe a bit about what the conversation has to do with.
EDIT: so I asked protonmail directly about it and they confirmed its only publicly available information that they can get. For instance they can try and verify if a certain email address exists. However proton told me that they actively watch for this kind of thing and block IPS trying to do this sort of monitoring.
This new generation can't do anything and spends money frivolously.... This generation is too stingy and resourceful.... Guys pick a damn lane.