NO2ID

Startpage privacy policy gets even better.
https://us4.startpage.com/uk/press/startpage-privacy-gets-better.html

Startpage Stops Recording Browser and Platform Information Entirely.

Great news! As of this week, Startpage will no longer record browser type and platform information (also known as the "user agent") of our users. This change has gone live on both Startpage and our sister search engine Ixquick (http://www.Ixquick.com), and translation of the text into non-English languages is underway.

The Data Collection section of our Privacy Policy has been revised to reflect this change. Our privacy policy now reads as follows:

Data Collection

We don't collect any personal information on our visitors. Nada. Zilch. Zero.
When you use Startpage, we do not record your IP address, we do not record which browser you are using (Internet Explorer, Safari, Firefox, etc.), we do not record your computer platform (Windows, Mac, Linux, etc.), and we do not record your search words or phrases. In fact, the only information we do record is an aggregate total of how many searches are performed on our website each day (a measure of overall traffic), and those overall traffic numbers broken down by language.
Our zero data collection policy protects your privacy, since your IP address, browser, and platform information can be combined with other data to uniquely identify your computer, your location, or you. It is also important not to record search terms, since they can convey personal information as well. (Think of someone entering their own name and/or social security number.)

** Not connected to Startpage - but please consider using startpage as your default search engine to replace google - it's a meta search, so you'll get google results, via a proxy - so Google will never see you or your IP.

Do they not keep some kind of "server logs" though, solely for "performance reasons" which are "anonymised" after 2 years and "deleted" after only 30 years.

I don't think they store the searches or the IP's. They are deleted - so making startpage unable to comply with a court order to locate and hand over data. They literally do not have it stored on server logs. The logs (from my understanding) are deleted. But I'm happy for you to doublecheck my understanding on this point.
https://www.startpage.com/eng/aboutstartpage/

Here's hoping this is an easy tool that everyone can use to maintain privacy from the Google infrastructure.

1. Startpage, and its sister search engine Ixquick, are the only third-party certified search engines in the world that do not record your IP address or track your searches.

2. Q: Had Startpage ever data mined its search data for commercial use before 2006? In its history before June 2006, Startpage had never used IP addresses and Unique ID cookies for anything other than tracking its own statistics and improving our site's performance . Unlike most of our competitors, we are an independent company and unable to combine user data with other services we offer. As such, these records had no commercial value to us. Since June 2006, and especially after January 2009 there is nothing to mine.

3. Q: I am getting personalized or localized ads while I am using Startpage.com. How is this possible? Whenever you search with Startpage, your SEARCH is not recorded, your IP ADDRESS is not recorded, your IDENTITY is not recorded, no TRACKING COOKIES are placed on your browser, and our SSL ENCRYPTION ensures that your ISP or hackers can't eavesdrop. You are never seen by any of the search engines we query, including Google, even though you receive authentic Google results through Startpage.

But "deleted" means they are stored in the first place - why? And also the Tor Project had a run-in with this outfit - seems they have taken to blocking connections from the Tor network. And lastly startpage is based in the USA, so that is privacy right out the window. Trust no one!

Why do google allow startpage to "scrape" their results? Look what happened to the now defunct Scroogle.

Startpage is basically ixquick, and based in Holland, operating under EU law.
Google have an advertising contract with them, for untargetted ad's.

Here's a radio discussion of it (sorry about the American accents).

Search Engines & Your Privacy (1/5)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mxtxo8tn0E

Privacy advocate and expert Dr. Katherine Albrecht introduces us to a new search engine called Startpage and tells us what search engines should (and shouldn't) do. She is the author of Spychips, which explains how RFID technology tracks every move and purchase.