2026 DuckDuckGo Charitable Donations: $1M to privacy and digital competition non-profits around the world

This year, DuckDuckGo is donating $1,000,000 to organizations working to make the internet more private, more secure, and more competitive. 2026 marks our 16th year of giving support to organizations that share our vision of raising the standard of trust online, bringing our total donations since 2011 to more than $9 million.

This year’s recipients span continents and causes, from litigating privacy violations and reimagining privacy rights to building open-source security tools and pushing for fair competition in tech, but they share a goal we care deeply about: an internet people can actually trust. Read on to learn more about their work.

$75,000 to Public Knowledge

Public Knowledge promotes freedom of expression, an open internet, and access to affordable communications tools and creative works. We work to shape policy on behalf of the public interest.

$50,000 to ARTICLE 19

ARTICLE 19 is an international think-do organisation, that takes its name from theUniversal Declaration of Human Rights, and works to propel the freedom of expression movement, fighting censorship, defending dissenting voices and advocating against laws and practices that silence.

$50,000 to Demand Progress

Demand Progress Education Fund empowers people to understand how our communications and governance systems should serve democracy — and how corporate power threatens our economy and our democratic future.

$50,000 to the Digital Progress Institute

The Digital Progress Institute seeks to bridge the tech-telecom policy divide through incremental, bipartisan measures in line with its principles of bringing about ubiquitous broadband, 5G and beyond, privacy for every American, real competition in digital markets, and a full-stack framework for Internet policy issues.

$50,000 to European Digital Rights (EDRi)

With more than two decades of advocacy experience, European Digital Rights (EDRi) is the go-to, nongovernmental network working on EU and national laws and policies on privacy, freedom of expression, participation online, data protection and technology policy. EDRi unites over 50 organizations from across Europe and beyond.

$50,000 to Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte (GFF)

The Society for Civil Rights (Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte e.V., or GFF) is an independent, donor-funded organization based in Germany that defends fundamental and human rights through legal action. GFF strengthens democracy and civil society, protects against disproportionate surveillance, and advocates for equal rights and social participation for everyone.

$50,000 to the Open Home Foundation

The Open Home Foundation fights for the fundamental principles of privacy, choice, and sustainability for smart homes. And for every person who lives in one. It is best known as the organization that owns and governs Home Assistant, among many other projects crucial to the open home.

$50,000 to Signal

Signal Technology Foundation protects free expression and enables secure global communication through open source privacy technology.

$50,000 to Tech Policy Press

Tech Policy Press publishes reporting, analysis, and perspective on events, issues, and ideas at the intersection of technology and democracy.

$45,000 to the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project (S.T.O.P.)

S.T.O.P. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization working to defend civil rights and privacy through community education, advocacy, research, and litigation.

$30,000 to the Internet Security Research Group

Our mission is to protect Internet users by lowering monetary, technological, and informational barriers to a more secure and privacy-respecting Internet. Our three projects, Let's Encrypt, Prossimo, and Divvi Up, improve the security and privacy of billions of people using the Internet every day.

$25,000 to Algorithmic Justice League (AJL)

The Algorithmic Justice League’s mission is to raise awareness about the impacts of AI, equip advocates with empirical research, build the voice and choice of the most impacted communities, and galvanize researchers, policy makers, and industry practitioners to mitigate AI harms and biases.

$25,000 to the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL)

The Competition Law Forum at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (BIICL) is a centre of excellence for competition and antitrust law and policy, bringing together leading experts to consider latest developments and best practice, whilst also producing influential research that helps to shape legislation and inform competition policy at national, European and global levels. Most recently this has included suggesting a legislative change to allow the Competition and Markets Authority to rely on final decisions from the Competition Appeal Tribunal to impose remedies in a reverse follow-on mechanism.

$25,000 to Bull Moose Institute

The Bull Moose Institute develops and promotes policies to level the economic playing field, protect workers, and restore the American dream.

$25,000 to Consumers International

Consumers International is the global membership organisation for consumer rights groups. Founded in 1960, we bring together over 190 member organisations in more than 100 countries, with a mission to empower and champion the rights of consumers everywhere and to build a fair, safe and sustainable marketplace. Our work to help create a digital life that consumers can trust includes advocating for personal data privacy as a public good, through Privacy Principles that call for consumers’ data to be used in their interest, especially in the age of AI.

$25,000 to Digital Rights Watch

Digital Rights Watch is Australia's leading digital rights organisation. They defend and promote privacy, democracy, fairness and fundamental rights in the digital age.

$25,000 to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)

EFF is the leading nonprofit organization defending civil liberties in our digital world, ensuring that technology supports freedom, justice, and innovation for all people of the world.

$25,000 to the Ius Omnibus

Founded in Portugal in 2020, Ius Omnibus is a non-profit consumer protection association dedicated to pursuing collective legal actions throughout the European Union. Its mission is to hold corporations accountable for violations of consumer rights and to guarantee effective, cost-free access to justice for all affected consumers.

$25,000 to noyb

noyb is committed to the legal enforcement of European data protection laws and has filed more than 850 cases against numerous intentional infringements by Big Tech companies - to make online privacy a reality for everyone.

$25,000 to the Internet Archive

The Internet Archive's mission is to provide "Universal Access to All Knowledge" by preserving and providing an open-source record of our cultural, historical and digital materials online. Our collections are freely accessible and are available to researchers, historians, scholars, news reporters and the public to read, learn, and explore for free.

$25,000 to the OpenMedia

OpenMedia is a community-driven organization that works to keep the Internet open, affordable, and surveillance-free. We operate as a civic engagement platform to educate, engage, and empower Internet users to advance digital rights around the world.

$25,000 to the Open Rights Group (ORG)

Open Rights Group is the UK's largest grassroots digital rights campaigning organisation, working to protect everyone's rights to privacy and free speech online. We fight for a fair digital environment where technology supports justice, equality and freedom. We campaign, lobby, go to court – whatever it takes to challenge restrictions to our human rights.

$25,000 to the Open Source Technology Improvement Fund (OSTIF)

This year, OSTIF launched a new initiative called Project VLAT. This initiative, which combines frontier AI models with Senior Security Researchers, has already triaged and fixed over 500 findings with security impact, with several hundred more in progress across critical open source projects and ecosystems. Our security uplifts to open source projects wouldn't be possible without the continued support from DuckDuckGo. We are honored to be part of this program and contribute to a more secure Internet ecosystem.

$25,000 to Perl and Raku Foundation

The Perl and Raku Foundation is dedicated to the advancement of the Perl and Raku programming languages, through open discussion, collaboration, design, and code.

$25,000 to Privacy Rights Clearinghouse

Privacy Rights Clearinghouse focuses on increasing access to information, policy discussions, and meaningful rights so that data privacy can be a reality for everyone.

$25,000 to Restore the Fourth

Restore The Fourth advocates in legislatures and with the courts, for robust Fourth Amendment protections against government surveillance.

$25,000 to the Tech Oversight Project

The Tech Oversight Project is a nonprofit organization dedicated to reining in Big Tech for the damages they've caused by urging lawmakers to support comprehensive legislation on antitrust, online safety, privacy, and artificial intelligence.

$25,000 to the Tor Project

At the Tor Project, we believe everyone should be able to explore the internet with privacy. We advance human rights and defend your privacy online through free, open source software and the decentralized Tor network.