True about not knowing 100% what their backend is doing, but how is that any different than trusting DDG or Google, or anyone for that matter?
https://searx.space/ reports on whether the client visible pieces match the expected code from source, and you should be using a VPN to search anyway if you care about masking your IP - or go through TOR to do so, or both.
you can set your preferences to whatever engines you want to use.
Include Google, or not. It's up to you.
The preferences are saved in a cookie which is not stored by the SearX application (can be verified by the source code on github).
Well at the end of the day I have no idea what source code they are actually running since I don't have access to the server.
But good to know you can exclude Google on demand.
True about not knowing 100% what their backend is doing, but how is that any different than trusting DDG or Google, or anyone for that matter?
https://searx.space/ reports on whether the client visible pieces match the expected code from source, and you should be using a VPN to search anyway if you care about masking your IP - or go through TOR to do so, or both.