E28 - Kelly Finnerty Director of Brand and Content at Startpage
Kelly_Finnerty
45:17
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, search, privacy, data, ad, companies, fingerprinting, marketing, google, advertisers, harry potter, term, create, tracking, identifiers, search engine, advertising, cookies, profile, marketers
SPEAKERS
Debbie Reynolds, Kelly Finnerty
Disclaimer 00:00
Personal views and opinions expressed by our podcast guests are their own and are not legal advice or official statements by their organizations.
Debbie Reynolds 00:14
All right. Hello, my name is Debbie Reynolds. And this is "The Data Diva" Talks Privacy Podcast, where we discuss data privacy issues with industry leaders around the world with information that businesses need to know now. This is going to be a really fun one. So I have Kelly Finnerty here as she is the director of brand and content at Startpage, which is the world's most private search engine. Hello.
Kelly Finnerty 00:42
Hi, Debbie. Thanks for having me.
Debbie Reynolds 00:45
Well, this is gonna be fun because I really like Startpage, and you guys have been really gracious to me. So we've collaborated in the past on a couple of things. So I guess I'll start out by saying how we got to know each other, how I got to know Startpage and Startpage got to know me. I think last year or the year before last, I can't remember.
01:06
Start
Kelly Finnerty 01:07
Last year.
Debbie Reynolds 01:07
Was it last year? Okay. And yeah, pandemic year, last year, someone from Startpage contacted me to have me do one of your privacy profiles, which was awesome. So it was just the interview where you guys are asking me things about, you know, just privacy in general, you know, my habits and the things that I do. And then you also created this caricature of me. It was really cool. And I use it a lot. Actually, you all did a new one for me. Thank you very much. But it's funny because I will comment on things you all post; you comment on stuff that I post, someone actually commented to me because I think that something came out of the news about you guys, and I say, Oh, this is so awesome. As someone from Startpage commented, and someone's like, oh my god, someone from Startpage actually commented on this thing that you made. But you know, I really, really liked the product. I like what you guys are doing. I like, you know, the direction that you're going. So I would love for you to kind of introduce yourself, your journey, and also kind of Startpage and what you all are up to.
Kelly Finnerty 02:22
Thanks. Yeah, no, it's been awesome to be in kind of your atmosphere. Debbie, I love "The Data Diva" name. First of all, like, when I found out that we were doing an interview with you, I was like, tell me more about "The Data Diva." But yeah, I know, you've just created such an amazing community and conversation around both privacy and security. And our mission at Startpage is to raise awareness of people's right to privacy and how they can protect it. Obviously, you're an industry leader, which is why we featured you and their privacy and action series. But so many kinds of just average laymen don't know that privacy is a right and that there are tools, and there are processes out there to be more private online. So we thank you for all that you're doing to raise awareness. And that's our page like, that's our number one mission. And then, you know, secondly, we have a product that's free, easy to use the private search engine, essentially, we remove your IP address all personal data, we send your search term to Google's search index. And then back to you as a user, you never have a search history. There is no data about you passed via that search. And you get Google quality results. So it's kind of a no-brainer in terms of really cutting down on the digital profile that big tech is cutting is creating on you. And, you know, we're really looking into people like yourself to help us raise awareness of how data collection works and how people can be more mindful and protect themselves.
Debbie Reynolds 04:03
Yeah, I think so. But I think the really important thing that you all do, what you talk about that matches very closely with me is that obviously I'm working with businesses and you're working with businesses to then we, as individuals, humans, we have interests personally, in privacy. So that's where I feel like that synergy is, and that's something you know because privacy touches all of us, you know, whether you're in the privacy business or not, all of us have to make our own minds up about how we feel about privacy and what we're willing to do to have it
Kelly Finnerty 04:42
That is so true. And like, you know, double underline the word personal that you used there. Because, for myself, I lead marketing or marketing at Startpage, I was the director of branded content. So, you know, we really have to be honest with ourselves, and we walk up a fine line between marketing and online privacy. And so we really make sure that the brand values that we have of true privacy best results and choice really ring true. And we're marketing to people.
Debbie Reynolds 05:37
Do you know why I love talking about marketing people? So this is gonna be a fascinating question and answer session with you today. So there, there have been tectonic shifts, I would say, probably the last ten years, like five or ten years and prior in marketing, and I think it will probably be, again, probably for the next five years or so. But tell me a little bit about how marketing has changed in terms of, you know, all the privacy regulations, and all the changes that have to be made by marketing people, you know, I feel like people who were in marketing were like, sort of the frontline folks that, for example, when GDPR came out, you know, companies weren't ready to deal with the backlog of stuff, they were doing the back office, they are really interested in kind of that storefront or forward public-facing issues dealing with privacy and cookies. So tell me a little bit about that journey, how that journey has been with you, and talk to me about what you think about that may happen in the future.
Kelly Finnerty 06:48
Yeah, the big tectonic shift, really, I think, comes down to how personalized marketing has become because there are just more and more identifiers, unique identifiers per person out there. And that's really what digital marketing has lent itself to. So whether it's cookies, IP addresses, browser fingerprinting, specific ad IDs, MAC addresses, you name it, right, these are all identifiers that digital ad companies and the Googles the Facebooks, the Amazons are, you know, constantly looking for these identifiers and ways to set tracking on people. And so those are valuable to advertisers to companies who are trying to sell because they want that person who is absolutely in that moment, perfect for that product. However, there are some really invasive realities to that. And, and finally, you know, it all is kind of happening very secretly, you know, essentially, the digital advertising world has done a great job to create this hall of one-way mirrors, where, when you and I are the average person is online, they're looking at a website, they're on their phone, they're on an app, but they don't see that other side of the one-way mirror where that person is, all of their browsing history, all of their search terms, the purchases that they're making, are being collected into this profile. And, you know, on a one-off basis, it might not mean much, but when you're collecting that amount of personal information about a person over a year, I mean, that is a really in-depth look at that person. And so new legislation, like GDPR, is giving people the right to request that information and to have it deleted. It's also asking for or demanding that companies create opt-in options versus opt-out. So GDPR enforces people to say, Yes, I opt-in for tracking versus currently, in the US, you have to go in and manually change your settings to opt-out of it. And so just that in itself, most people are not going to take that extra step to opt-out. So it would be great to see more legislation that was enforcing opt-in data tracking. CCPR is getting in that in that realm. But again, that's just for California. And all of these laws are fantastic because they create conversation, but it really will come down to how they're enforced.
Debbie Reynolds 09:48
Yeah, I think one thing that I'm seeing is you obviously see because this is your wheelhouse is companies like Apple and companies like Google trying to kind of separate themselves in a way from third party marketers, by the way, that they use their tools to try to force those marketers to try to get consent from the individuals as opposed to piggybacking off of their first-party relationship with the individual. What are your thoughts about that?
Kelly Finnerty 10:24
I mean, you said that very succinctly and perfectly right, there's first-party tracking, and there's third-party tracking, the volume of the audience that both Google and Facebook have is so huge that first-party tracking is pretty sufficient for them. And then the third party tracking Google's decision to move away from that, you know, it was to move away from that, but then to move it to a different type of tracking, right. So first, for Startpage, we keep it super simple, right? We don't do the first party; we don't do the third party. We do not track or log anything about our users. And for us, that is the best thing that we can do. And we really push people towards that. It's not feasible for every company out there. But I would just say that, you know, indeed, third, party tracking isn't the magic bullet that's going to solve people's privacy issues.
Debbie Reynolds 11:26
No, I think of it more as a corporate legal risk issue with those with Google and Apple, so it's a way for them to say, you know, hey, regulators, we're not, you know, giving this information to people, and we're forcing these third parties to get, you know, this information. But then, on the other hand, things like FLOC or Google, I don't. I guess the only way I can describe it is being touted as a replacement for cookies. But cookies aren't going away. That's the first thing. So even if people decide not to use them in those kinds of wacky, one-way mirror ways that you're saying, they'll still exist, and then there is no technological or legal impediment for them to have ever not done FLOC's anyway. So I also don't see that as being a replacement for cookies, because this to me, is like, okay, we're not using cookies, but we're gonna do this other thing that achieves almost the same thing, if not worse.
Kelly Finnerty 12:36
Definitely, again, all of it comes down to also the regulation behind all of this. So it really feels. I'm so glad these conversations are happening. I'm so glad that people's eyes are being open to it to the point that Apple's doing huge multi-million-dollar television and out-of-home campaigns about privacy, like privacy, is on the top of mind. For people, they want it. Yeah. But we really have to dig deep into how is it actually being enforced and protected by these companies? And I don't think we're there yet with any of the major big tech players.
Debbie Reynolds 13:13
No, I think so. I read a stat yesterday. It was really interesting. So for the Apple, iOS 14.5, which had this app was app accountability, I forget what they call att, app tracing accountability. Anyway, they said that 95% of the people who downloaded that version have opted out of advertising. So only 5%. So far, I have opted into this advertising. And so to me, those two things, one, it really proves the point that people are caring about their privacy and want more control over their data. And then the second thing is, and this is the point that we've tried to prove all along is that privacy can be a differentiator, and it can be profitable. So instead of selling everything about everyone protecting their data could actually create more opportunities for your business.
Kelly Finnerty 14:18
Absolutely, I mean, we're a 15-year-old company, which is kind of in some ways, good to say in some ways, like, well, why doesn't everybody know about you yet, but we have been profitable since inception. Essentially, we make money through contextual advertising. So if you search for bicycles, you will on your search results page, three ads above, and then it will say your web results below. Those three ads are based on the search term bicycle, so any advertiser who says I would like to show my ad if someone types in bicycle appear. And in that realm that it's not about, you know, females in this location recently bought spandex, spandex cycling outfits. So so it's not behavioral advertising based on the individual and their prior browsing history. It's simply based on the contextual search term used. So, yeah, that and if you think about it, if you're searching for bicycles, and you see an ad for a bicycle, that's complete, like, that's not invading someone's privacy, that's not targeting somebody or profiling, somebody, it's just a simple like, you want it, here are some options. For us, that contextual advertising is also how we guide ourselves through our own marketing. You know, if somebody is searching for ways to be more private online, we feel comfortable delivering that ad to them. But you know, we wouldn't do it on any type of like fear-mongering basis, or something is really playing around with someone's psyche.
Debbie Reynolds 15:57
Right. You know, I love the fact that you talked a little bit about contextual versus behavioral ads. I guess I want to touch a little bit on context. And it's something I've talked about a lot. So when you search for something in your search browser, companies make inferences about what they think that you want or what they think it means. So I'll give you an example. So, my niece, she's 30 now, but when she was growing up, she loved Harry Potter. And so like, every time the book came out, or something like she called Auntie and Auntie would buy her, like the hardcopy, first edition, blah, blah, blah. And somewhere, somehow in the database somewhere, you know, they have me associated with Harry Potter, which I don't like. Okay, so I've never watched those movies or anything like that. But that is an example of how a lack of context gets associated with someone. So I don't like Harry Potter, but because I've searched for it because I purchase other Harry Potter things somewhere, somehow someone thinks that like, Harry Potter. So talk to me a little bit about how your search engine works in a way that that type of inference doesn't get created.
Kelly Finnerty 17:24
That's it, and you're a good Aunt. But sorry, you've gotten put in that mix. Okay, so first, I'll just talk about how it actually works on a non-private traditional search engine. So essentially, you search for Harry Potter. And there are, you know, hundreds, thousands of advertisers out there who are interested in this search term and may have a bid behind it or a similar bid behind it. And there will be a numerical bid. This will happen across other web pages as well who are trying to deliver Google ad network ads or Microsoft Bing network ads. And they will basically deliver the advertiser who has the highest bid the ad to you when you search for Harry Potter. Now, the truth is, during that real-time bidding process is that all of the advertisers out there can see that you from your IP address from your, you know, your advertising ID or what have you, whatever identifier they're using, they can see that you have searched for Harry Potter. So even advertisers, and a lot of times, this is what data harvesters use. They are shadow bidding these terms. And they are just going to collect what they see, or they see your information. And they can actually just collect that on a list even if they are not even the person to show the ad for that search. So then now you are on a potential data harvesters list of people interested in Harry Potter. So while you might not receive their ad when you're searching for it, you might receive your bit down the line when you're on a different website or, you know, on your phone and see an ad pop up that actually might be coming from a data harvester who is shadow bidding and during the real-time buying process, and then serves you up puts you on a list adds you to a list for another Facebook campaign on another app product or another campaign. And then you're getting you're still in that Harry Potter mode so that the life cycle for a lot of these things is pretty long in terms of Harry Potter being in your world, whether you like it or not.
Debbie Reynolds 19:43
Right? I love the way you explained that. That and then I would love for you to explain. So I figured this out myself because I'm just extremely curious about how things work, how data flows work. I was one of the kids that will fill out the little forms, and the magazines and stuff send them in and spell my name wrong just to see what will come back and stuff like that. But basically, you know, one of the things that happen when people search on traditional search engines that they hate is like, say you bought a shirt off Amazon or something, and then you go do some other search, and then that shirt pops up in like an ad or something like that. And the reason why that happens is that now that these marketers know you're interested in that shirt, they want to try to tag along so that if in the future you buy that shirt, they could get a credit for having followed you. And then you made a purchase, even though they even make a purchase because of that, right?
Kelly Finnerty 20:46
Yeah, we call this conversion or like, they call these conversion pixels. That's really the term Facebook uses. This can go all the way through to online purchases. So they'll need this conversion like pixel will be set on your ID. And if you search for something, went to the site, and then in a week came back and purchased it, they will get you to know, that referral fee, they'll get that that advertising feeds. It goes so far as to actually if you have, you can have location-based data on your phone, so it can track you and show hey, this ad actually made Debbie go in-store and track you all the way through from your home to the store to show that the conversion was made in a physical way.
Debbie Reynolds 21:36
Right? That's ridiculous.
Kelly Finnerty 21:38
It's really creepy. So I say so, Startpage, right. There are areas where, you know, you have to put a little bit more effort in when you're searching on Startpage. So if you're searching for like coffee near me, we have no idea who you are or where you are. So you do have to put in like coffee near zip code or city or some sort of identifier of location. But then you can access that, you know, coffee shop, and, you know, review different ones nearby. Without you know, having like, mobile ads popping up like go here, go here, or I see that you're near this place, you know, like just, it's creepy, and it's unnecessary. This year, we launched a shopping feature. So you can actually type in and shop for products. And you'll see the visual of the products, the prices of it on there. And shopping Startpage is really nice because also they can't set price trackers on you. Right. So price shoppers are proven real, but like it is so hard to get, you know, companies to admit to it. It's like all a part of their black box. But studies haven't done what typically they'll do price trackers based on your zip code. So if you're in a higher-income area, you might receive higher prices. If you're, if you're located close to their store, they might like ping you with a discount because you're more incentivized to go in and person. It is proven that people who have Apple devices are willing to pay three times as much as people with Android. So a lot of times, you won't. You'll receive either a higher price or fewer discounts if you're searching off an Apple device. If you do your shopping off the Startpage, you know, we have no idea who you are, what device you're using. So we can't, so companies can't set those price trackers on us. It's a really useful feature.
Debbie Reynolds 23:34
Yeah, I have two phones. Two different phones that I use are two different methods, especially when I'm searching for things like airfare, airline tickets.
Kelly Finnerty 23:43
Oh, yeah.
Debbie Reynolds 23:45
Yeah. So I'll search on a different everything to just find the price. And then once I know the price, I go directly to the place they have it, and then I purchase it. So I don't do the price matching on the same device because I noticed that they'll drive up the price. And it'll be different based on the browser they're gonna use like, so I'm hip to all the tricks.
Kelly Finnerty 24:10
Good. I'm really glad to hear that.
Debbie Reynolds 24:14
I love this. It's fascinating. And I think a lot of people don't know the things you're talking about are very important because I feel like once you know, then you know what you're dealing with. And you know how to figure out the best ways around that. I love to talk about fingerprinting. Okay, so part of and this goes back again to Apple and Google, and then I just want to talk about this at a high level in general. So part of the reasons why in addition to Apple doing iOS 14.5 update, in terms of trying to separate themselves from third parties, right? It's also they don't want these marketers to use their services to fingerprint people, which means, you know, even though Apple may not be giving third-party marketers someone's Apple ID, right? The ID for advertising. If a marketer has enough other tangential information about the person, they could find out who they are anyway. So that's one thing that they're trying to stop in their app store. They're trying to stop having giving companies enough information where they will try to fingerprint someone. And I think this is similar to what Google is doing. But that does not mean that people, that doesn't mean that fingerprinting is stopping. I think fingerprinting will continue. And I also think this is the opposite of what you guys are doing. In order to do a lot of this fingerprinting, a lot of apps and applications will start asking more for your location. And so the fact that you're not asking for a location is very important. What are your thoughts about that?
Kelly Finnerty 26:05
Yes, fingerprinting is something that we feel very strongly about here. We do not promote or use any type of fingerprinting or things like ever cookies, and we oppose Canvas fingerprinting. And the way that we do is, you know, we don't track or log any users. And then also we have a feature called anonymous view. So when you search for a search term on Startpage, next to each web result, we have a mask icon. And it's called anonymous view; if you click on that, it will actually open websites using a proxy. And that proxy ensures that no fingerprint can be set on you. So it's actually set on like the Startpage proxy. So you'll see the timezone set as Startpage's timezone. So in terms of fingerprinting, we won't fingerprint people. And then we go the next step forward from that, where you can actually access websites, explore and hire websites via our proxy, ensuring that you yourself won't be fingerprinted. And that works on both desktop and mobile.
Debbie Reynolds 27:18
Oh, awesome. That's wonderful. That's wonderful. So you are recently doing a refresh on the look and feel of your page and stuff like that. But one of the features you all added, which I think is really cool. And I think a lot of other people will start to do that online; It is that you have images that you show that on your browser that is pixelated, right? So they're sort of put out there in a way that people can't use it for, like facial recognition and stuff like that, if I do data scraping and stuff. Tell me a little bit about that.
Kelly Finnerty 27:59
Yeah, so thanks for bringing up the brand refresh. It's something that we've been working on, we took very seriously, we definitely did a lot of user testing, and even with our core insider group of Startpage fans. So we call it the kind of pixel people, and essentially, it's really hard to explain what Startpage does because the user doesn't see it, right? It just looks and feels and acts like a standard search engine. And the user doesn't get to see all of the layers of us removing your IP address and personal data at the premise server a sending your search term to the search index of only the search term, and sending it back to you and this protective layer. So for us, these pixel people and then anonymized faces really represent how Startpage helps anyone be anonymous online. It helps bring a little bit more of that tangible understanding of what it's like to search on Startpage. And I do think it's a good tool to start a conversation, as you were saying, of being mindful about how much personal data we're putting out there in general. When I talk about that thin line that Startpage walks, right, we are on Instagram, we're on Facebook, we're on Twitter, creating content and talking to people. And the reason why we're on those platforms is because there are so many people that we can reach and raise awareness around data privacy. So for us, this pixelated photography treatment is a way for us to spark that conversation about data privacy and protecting personal data for people. This hasn't been announced publicly yet, but I feel comfortable sharing it with you here. Later this month in May we are doing a large media advertising campaign in the city of Berlin, Germany. And a big part of that campaign will be an Instagram filter that allows anyone to do a pixelated story Instagram story of their own. And for us, we really it's important for us to kind of talk about and have people have conversations around. What are you sharing online? And, you know, should you really share that?
Debbie Reynolds 30:30
Right? So I would love to pitch this question to you. And this, this gets everyone's eyes rolling, right? People who are in data work, data-centric work, which is people who say, I have nothing to hide. What do you say when people say that?
Kelly Finnerty 30:50
I mean, Glenn Greenwald said it best, you have nothing to hide, but you have a lot to protect. And the truth is, you know, at night, you know, you close your curtains because you don't want everyone looking in and seeing what you're having for dinner or what TV you're watching; privacy is a real thing. And while you might not notice the one-way mirror of people watching you online, they are. And it's time for us to really let people know that that's happening. And also give them tools give them legislation and laws that protect them.
Debbie Reynolds 31:28
Right.
Kelly Finnerty 31:29
And if you say that you can't be manipulated by online advertising, I think you need to think again, because every single day, the algorithms that either you're building from your search history, or algorithms that are being built by engineers, based on what they want you to do, are impacting your life.
Debbie Reynolds 31:49
Absolutely. And then kind of the flip side of that is not even advertising. So, unfortunately, sometimes people collect this information for purposes that are harmful. So let's say you go online, you search for cancer treatment, you know, maybe you're trying to find out about a friend, are we doing research for a paper? You know, what have a company infers that maybe you have cancer or you know, or had cancer, and they decide they don't want to interview you for a job? How would you ever even know that?
Kelly Finnerty 32:24
And that's the part of these data harvester lists that people don't even realize. So, you know, while Google and Facebook might be really adhering to some great advertising practices, there's data harvesters, you can still see and create those lists per each real-time buy in the UK, there's an article where a data harvester created a list of people searching about alcoholism and sold that to alcohol brands to add to their online marketing mix.
Debbie Reynolds 32:58
Oh, wow, that's terrible. It's terrible.
Kelly Finnerty 33:01
And then, you know, Cambridge Analytica is such a huge example of how this falls into politics. There's actually an app out right now as well that lets you see which ads you're being served and what you were being served during the 2020 election, to really see like, oh, I'm getting this message from this candidate with and seeing the variety of messages that they're sending out to different people. And then you just realize, like, okay, well, which one do you really believe? Which one do you really stand by?
Debbie Reynolds 33:35
Yeah, I say the people's like, it gives you the impression that you're in a library, and you can see everything, but actually, you're only in one section, they can't see. They can pull you down into a track or a line of thinking or, or echo chamber, basically. So they'll put you in a location, whereas other people who kind of echo that same thing, but it may not even be true. It's just reinforcing something that you may have seen, or you look bad, and it gives you the impression that you see everything, but you aren't.
Kelly Finnerty 34:12
I haven't heard that reference before, but I really liked that, and I might borrow it, go for it. I mean, the amount of misinformation spread during the 2020 elections and even during COVID is insane. And that's why we really encourage Startpage as a place where you can go, and if you search for a topic, you are not being profiled by your past search history. You're not being profiled by an advertiser or a candidate, a government candidate. So it is really, and we're also about choice, right? So like I would, I would really recommend anyone to start their search with Startpage. But then, if you're not like, you can go other places and look around, but it's a really good place to start because you will see the most unbiased, unprofiled search results possible.
Debbie Reynolds 35:03
Yeah, I like it because I like to get search results that are not filtered. So I want to see everything. And then I want to be able to curate my search as opposed to the way search happens a lot of times on other platforms. They've already limited what you can see. And then you search, you think you see everything, but you only see kind of that little section in the library. Unless you do something radical to break out of that, like one thing that I don't do is that I don't put my zip code in and search results because I want to see everything I don't want to see. You know, if I'm looking for Bob's Pizza, they may be assuming that I'm going to get pizza and it's going to be around me, that may not be you know, maybe I'm looking for a store in Australia called Bob's Pizza, you know, I'm saying. So you have to do something additional that most people don't do to kind of break out of that little silo.
Kelly Finnerty 36:08
Definitely, but I mean, if you're searching for Bob's Pizza on a traditional non-private search engine, they are going to give you pizza places around you. They're not going to give you like the top level. But yeah, but that's a perfect example of what Startpage is great for us to get. What is the highest-ranking worldwide unbiased on profiled search results? That's what you'll find.
Debbie Reynolds 36:31
Yeah, So there was a case going on. I'm all kind of shocked it's even going forward, actually, about Google's incognito mode. So their incognito mode really was a way for people to do searching on a device and not have the actual history recorded on the device. Even though Google has the history and they know exactly what to search for. So the case is about people not understanding or thinking that incognito mode was also erasing the search results from Google, which it wasn't. So I would love for you to kind of talk about this in parallel. I think Startpage works in a way that people may think incognito really should work, as opposed to the way that it was put together by Google, which seemed totally legitimate. That's the purpose of it is not to erase search results that you put into Google is just to make sure that your results your history isn't on the device that you're searching on at that moment. Right.
Kelly Finnerty 37:45
Yeah. And this just goes down to how complicated and dense privacy policies are right that, like, people aren't fully reading them. So people said, incognito. Okay. So no one will see my search for your browsing history. Awesome. Really, what it was saying was, no one on your device will see your search or browsing history. Still, all the third parties, the first-party data is being passed through, and it's still going straight into that digital profile that big tech is collecting on you. What, you know, and I don't know, details of the lawsuit, but I do know that. And this is something that one of our users said, and the anonymous view is everything that people hoped incognito was, right? The anonymous view completely ensures that there is no trace of an individual user on that website. All that website sees his Startpage there. So not only is this information not being passed to your device, but it's also not being passed to both first party and third party data collectors.
Debbie Reynolds 38:55
Yeah, I love it.
Kelly Finnerty 38:57
Yeah, I mean, for us, we're just like, anyone talking about it? We're like, just try it on this. Do you promise, like, it's everything that you were hoping this was gonna be? It's just a matter of getting people to trial it.
Debbie Reynolds 39:10
Totally, totally. I highly recommend it. I love it. I like what you guys are doing. Because not everything you want to search you want to be remembered, you know, and then I work with a lot of different clients. So it's like almost any search engine that you use. They assume that the search you're doing is for yourself and not for someone else. So it sort of messes up the way that you want to use it. I don't know. I guess it's in a way like, let's say you have Netflix and someone uses your profile to watch movies, and you get all these crazy recommendations, stuff like that.
Kelly Finnerty 39:47
Definitely, definitely. I mean, we've heard from people who are writers, and they say, you know, I'll go super deep into investigating this subject. And then it's really annoying to have these ads of the subject, like pop up everywhere. And it's like not anything that I want. It's just something that was doing for work that research will also have journalists say, you know, they don't want a paper trail, that they were searching for a specific topic because they don't want that search history to be subpoenaed or tracks or to put them on some sort of list for looking for that information. Debbie, I have a question for you. Because you're talking to kind of all the privacy and security leaders like you have such a just an engaged group of people, you know, how many people do you feel, are aware that a private search engine, like Startpage or just a private search in general, exists?
Debbie Reynolds 40:47
You know, what, not a lot. I have some very high-level tech people, and they know, so they sort of go through and try to put things together in; some people may not care as much, you know what I mean? So I think it's just a very diverse group. I think, whatever you put together, whatever is easiest for people to do, that's what they're gonna do. So if you can make Startpage easier for someone to use, and that's something else so they can get good results. I think they'll use it just because, you know, I think Jeff Bezos is, you know, quadrillionaire there right now because he knows that people would rather press a button and have someone come to their house, they go out and get it. So yeah, it's so true.
Kelly Finnerty 41:37
I mean, from like, my husband that to family members, I told them about, you know, I work at Startpage, this is what we do. And I was like, oh, my gosh, that's so amazing. Like, how come I never heard of it? This is so great. I'll use it. Okay, like, a week goes by? How's it going using it? I haven't used it yet. So then I have to like manually go into their phone, set it as their home screen icon, I have to go into their desktop and, like, set it as their default search engine. There is that difference between people saying I want privacy, and then people like going that extra step to do it. So that's where we're at as a company of raising awareness by talking to, you know, people who are educated and super informed and have that platform like you. Yeah, and then just doing our best to make it as easy as possible to use our page.
Debbie Reynolds 42:13
So that's wonderful. So I want to ask this question. I asked everyone, it was the world, according to Kelly, and we did everything you say, what will be your wish for privacy anywhere? Whether it's regulation or technology, or anywhere in the world?
Kelly Finnerty 42:50
To not be creepy? I mean, yeah, I guess there's like thinking about what you would feel comfortable of somebody tracking or targeting you is, and applying that to your own business practices, or product feature design or marketing strategy is really thinking about? How would you feel if someone was doing that to you or to your family and then applying that to your own business decisions?
Debbie Reynolds 43:21
I agree with that wholeheartedly. I tell people that all the time. It's like, get out of the business mindset for a second and think about what you would think was acceptable for you. As for your family, what would you think would be, you know, appropriate, and then, you know, also think I tell people to think of data like you're putting money in a bank. So let's say you put money in a bank, and you say you want to know your balance, and the bank says, well, we don't want to show you your balance. You would go ballistic.
Kelly Finnerty 43:52
I like that.
Debbie Reynolds 43:53
Data is the same way. It's like, the data belongs to the individual. And companies have a responsibility to be transparent about how they're using that data. And then what you guys are doing, which I love, is like, you don't want to collect data that you don't need, which is what I think all companies should be thinking about.
Kelly Finnerty 44:14
It's so true. Yeah, that's actually how the company was even started, you know? Before Startpage was in existence, it was a regular search engine. And our founder, the engineering team, came to our founder and said, hey, we need some more money for some more servers for all the data we're collecting on people. And he was like, okay, well, before I write this check, tell me what data we're collecting. And you know, when you see that around one singular IP address, someone researching their health, family issues, financial issues, interests, locations, they're going, and you can see that all the way down to one person. He was like, no, no way. Like, this is out of hand. And, and from that day made the decision to make it a private search engine simply because of that matter.
Debbie Reynolds 45:08
That's fantastic. I love that. I love that. So wow, excellent. Well, this is a fantastic session. I'm happy to have you come back. Because you know, I would love to find out what's happening in Germany. That sounds wonderful.
Kelly Finnerty 45:23
We will keep you posted. We follow all that you do. We're big fans and supporters of you. So keep on pushing out that message and starting those conversations. You're just doing a great job, and we really appreciate it.
Debbie Reynolds 45:38
Thank you so much. Thank you. Well, we always have fun talking with you all. So you have your head on straight, and you're thinking in the right way. Yeah, well, we'll definitely talk soon. And thank you so much.
Kelly Finnerty 45:51
All right, Debbie. Have a good one.
Debbie Reynolds 45:53
All right. You too.
