Startpage at 20: what we got right, where we’ve struggled, and what’s next

Startpage turned 20 in June. We forgot to mention it at the time, but on brand for a company whose whole promise is not keeping records. So here’s the belated version: what we got right, where this year has been hard, and what we’re doing about it.

Where we started

In June 2006, some of you knew us as Ixquick. Our homepage back then had a small badge in the corner that said “Ixquick protects your privacy.” That was the whole idea: you should be able to search without someone keeping a record of it.

The Startpage name came later. The team and the promise stayed the same.

What hasn’t changed

Twenty years later, the basics are the same:

• We don’t log your searches.
• No tracking, no profiling.
• We don’t sell your data.

Not because you have something to hide, but because you have a lot to protect.

It’s been a tough year.

We’d rather say this plainly than pretend it’s been a smooth year. Between late September and mid-October, more than 1,000 of you sent us feedback, and most of it was about bot checks and blocks. Bots now make up most of the traffic that hits Startpage, so we added checks to protect the service. Too often those checks caught real people: “verifying your request” screens that looped, long waits, and blocks with no clear way out. We’re tuning those rules so they catch fewer real people. If you’re still getting stuck, send us a ticket and a person will look at it. But it isn’t lost on us that some of you have used Startpage from the start and suddenly couldn’t search. That’s on us.

Built for people

A lot of the internet is now built for bots, scrapers and engagement numbers. We are building Startpage for the person on the other side of the search box: the student, the parent checking a symptom at 2am, the person job-hunting before they’ve told anyone.

That’s the mission, and it hasn’t changed since that first badge in 2006: search without being the product. This product is never finished. We’ll keep working on it for you.

Thanks for 20 years. Some of you have had us as your homepage for most of them, and that means a lot.

The Startpage team