'Don't Be Google': The Rise of Privacy Focused Startups

Startups are taking on Google Analytics, a product used by more than half of the world's websites to understand people's browsing habits. Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV AFP/File
Startups are taking on Google Analytics, a product used by more than half of the world's websites to understand people's browsing habits. Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV AFP/File
TT
20

'Don't Be Google': The Rise of Privacy Focused Startups

Startups are taking on Google Analytics, a product used by more than half of the world's websites to understand people's browsing habits. Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV AFP/File
Startups are taking on Google Analytics, a product used by more than half of the world's websites to understand people's browsing habits. Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV AFP/File

Google once used the slogan "don't be evil" to distinguish itself from its competitors, but now a growing number of pro-privacy startups are rallying to the mantra "don't be Google".

They are taking on Google Analytics, a product used by more than half of the world's websites to understand people's browsing habits, AFP said.

"Google made a lot of good tools for a lot of people," says Marko Saric, a Dane living in Belgium who set up Plausible Analytics in Estonia in 2019.

"But over the years they changed their approach without really thinking what is right, what is wrong, what is evil, what is not."

Saric and many others are benefitting from GDPR, a European privacy regulation introduced in 2018 to control who can access personal data.

Last week, France followed Austria in declaring Google's practice of transferring personal data from the EU to its US servers was illegal under GDPR because the country does not have adequate protections.

Google disagrees, saying the data is anonymized and the scenarios envisaged in Europe are hypothetical.

Nevertheless, startups see an opening in a true David vs Goliath battle.

"The week that Google Analytics was ruled illegal by the Austrian DPA (data protection authority) was a good week for us," says Paul Jarvis, who runs Fathom Analytics from his home in Vancouver Island, Canada.

He says new subscriptions tripled over that week, though he does not give exact numbers.

Google dominates the analytics market with 57 percent of all websites using its service, according to survey group W3Techs. The best-established privacy-focused tool, Matomo, accounts for one percent of websites.

The smaller players know they are not going to overturn Google's domination, rather their aim is to inject a bit of fairness and choice into the market.

- 'Behemoth' application -
The supercharging moment for pro-privacy software developers came in 2013 when former CIA contractor Edward Snowden revealed how US security agencies were engaged in mass surveillance.

"We already knew some of it," says Matomo founder Matthieu Aubry. "But when he came out, we had proof that we weren't just paranoid or making stuff up."

Snowden showed how the US National Security Agency, aided by a system of secret courts, was able to gather personal data from users of websites including Google, Facebook and Microsoft.

Snowden's revelations helped to solidify support across Europe for its new privacy regulation and inspired software developers to make privacy central to their products.

The first thing the startups have taken aim at is the sheer complexity of Google Analytics.

"You have 1,000 different dashboards and all this data, but it doesn't help you if you don't understand it," says Michael Neuhauser, who launched Fair Analytics last month.

Jarvis, who had previously trained people to use Google Analytics, describes it as a "behemoth".

Unlike Google, the privacy-focused products do not use cookies to track users around the web and offer a much simpler array of data, helping them to keep within the boundaries of GDPR.

And they all make this a key selling point on their websites.

- 'An alternative internet' -
But making a living from these tools is no mean feat.

Saric of Plausible and Jarvis of Fathom both sank time and money into their projects before they could pay themselves a wage.

Both firms still operate with a startup mentality -- tiny teams working remotely across countries having direct contact with clients.

Aubry, who founded Matomo in 2007 when he was in his early 20s, remembers being in a similar position.

"For a long time, we didn't even have a business around the project, it was pure community," says the Frenchman from his home in Wellington, New Zealand.

But he says his firm now has global reach and he wants to help create "an alternative internet" not dominated by big tech.

His peers are at a much earlier stage but they certainly agree with the sentiment.

Jarvis reckons anyone switching from a big tech product is "a win for privacy" and helps to create a fairer system.

But a huge barrier remains: Google can afford to offer its tools for free, whereas the smaller firms need clients to pay, even if just a few dollars a month.

The privacy-focused firms say it is time to overhaul our understanding of these transactions.

"All of these free products that we use and love, we're not paying for them with money, we're paying for them with data and privacy," says Jarvis.

"We charge money for our product because it's just a more honest business model."



DeepSeek Faces Expulsion from App Stores in Germany

FILE - The smartphone apps DeepSeek page is seen on a smartphone screen in Beijing, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)
FILE - The smartphone apps DeepSeek page is seen on a smartphone screen in Beijing, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)
TT
20

DeepSeek Faces Expulsion from App Stores in Germany

FILE - The smartphone apps DeepSeek page is seen on a smartphone screen in Beijing, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)
FILE - The smartphone apps DeepSeek page is seen on a smartphone screen in Beijing, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)

Germany has taken steps towards blocking Chinese AI startup DeepSeek from the Apple and Google app stores due to concerns about data protection, according to a data protection authority commissioner in a statement on Friday.

DeepSeek has been reported to the two US tech giants as illegal content, said commissioner Meike Kamp, and the companies must now review the concerns and decide whether to block the app in Germany, Reuters reported.

"DeepSeek has not been able to provide my agency with convincing evidence that German users' data is protected in China to a level equivalent to that in the European Union," she said.

"Chinese authorities have far-reaching access rights to personal data within the sphere of influence of Chinese companies," she added.

The move comes after Reuters exclusively reported this week that DeepSeek is aiding China's military and intelligence operations.

DeepSeek, which shook the technology world in January with claims that it had developed an AI model that rivaled those from US firms such as ChatGPT creator OpenAI at much lower cost, says it stores numerous personal data, such as requests to the AI or uploaded files, on computers in China.