Cliqz for Android 1.0

Munich; 22 September 2016: The Munich-based Cliqz GmbH has just released the 1.0 version of its mobile browser, an Android app that features integrated quick-search and data-protection functions. In developing the app, the company set out to accomplish one specific goal: to provide everything as directly as possible while being both secure and anonymous. The new version also includes an anti-tracking function. The free app can be downloaded from Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?hl=en&id=com.cliqz.browser

“What you search for online and the websites you visit are none of anybody’s business,” said Jean-Paul Schmetz, the founder of Cliqz. “For us, it boils down to one simple statement: We don’t collect any data whatsoever about users. As a European company, we consciously act as an alternative to providers who unabashedly help themselves to the very private data of their users. We even go a step further and actively protect our users from the prying eyes of trackers.”

Protection from data vultures
The most critical improvement added to version 1.0 of Cliqz for Android is: The anti-tracking function that desktop users gained in March is now available for mobile purposes. With no configuration effort necessary, it effectively protects users from monitoring of their Internet activities by trackers. Cliqz does something more than just block cookies. Its anti-tracking function overwrites all data sent to third parties by tracking scripts that can be used to identify individual users.

This is necessary because the particularly tenacious members of the tracking community continuously add new weapons to their arsenals and employ increasingly sophisticated methods designed to recognise users of websites, monitor them and record their activities as completely as possible. People who use the Cliqz browser can turn the tables and monitor the anti-tracking window to see who is trying to latch onto identifiable data.

Browser with integrated search engine
A new type of search engine has been integrated into Cliqz for Android. When information is input into the address bar, boxes containing suggested websites will appear almost simultaneously. Just click a box and you are sent to the place where you want to be – without taking a detour that leads through separate search results. Wrong page? Just swipe to the next page and the one after it.

Because the Cliqz quick search engine displays relevant boxes as you type each letter, you frequently have the right search result even before you have finished typing. It takes just a few keystrokes to obtain the exact result you want. Popular or frequently visited website addresses are even automatically supplemented. In addition, Cliqz intelligently includes entries in the browser chronicle. Websites and content can be found in a snap as a result.

Cliqz displays useful information like weather forecasts, flight status, exchange rates, news headlines and football scores in smart results directly in the browser. Even more, users get all of these benefits even when the data link is poor.

Cliqz’s quick search is based on search engine technology developed by Cliqz GmbH itself. This technology works in tandem with a web index that the company also developed, independently of all other providers. The Cliqz quick search is designed for searches with navigation purposes and brings users directly to their goal more than 80 percent of the time. For more comprehensive searches about a term, product or topic (exploratory searching), Cliqz will directly connect users to conventional search engines – they just have to click the fourth box. Google is the default supplementary search engine. Users can also select a different one if they want.

Cliqz stands for privacy
The entire architecture used by Cliqz is based on the principle of privacy by design. The critical factor is the difference between usage data and user data. Cliqz servers store only anonymous, statistical usage data. Cliqz does not collect user data and any data that could be used to draw any conclusions about the Internet usage behaviour of individual users or individuals.

Transparent and open
The entire Cliqz browser is based on open source browser technologies (Cliqz for Windows, Mac and Linux and iOS on Firefox; Cliqz for Android on Lightning). Even the software code of the Cliqz applications is open source and is publicly available to anybody as a result. This is also the case for the Cliqz browser, the search engine and the human web technology used for the creation of the web index. As a result, anyone can see for himself or herself that Cliqz does not collect a single bit of personal data.