Mullvad: Shutting down our search proxy Leta
11 comments
·November 8, 2025stevage
What exactly did it do? And why can't it do that anymore?
supriyo-biswas
Most likely that people are switching to LLM based search products in droves and the real demand is there.
therein
Maybe you are but people are certainly not switching to LLM based search products in droves.
It is the exact opposite for me. Everyone hates the LLM based search products in my circles. Just look at this shitshow.
jdiff
Your circles might have a little more technical literacy than most. I'm working part time in retail at a hardware store currently and the amount of people who come in looking for parts specified exclusively by a single AI overview is mindboggling. People repairing car engines come in looking for bolts with specific lengths, materials, and thread pitches that AI told them they needed. I haven't had anyone come back and explicitly tell me that AI led them wrong, but I'm sure they've had to make multiple trips back out here.
Taek
Sad to see it go, at the same time I never used it and it seems that the rationale is highly pragmatic, so you certainly won't find me protesting the decision.
Privacy is an uphill battle, we should use our efforts where they make the most impact.
holysoles
For anyone looking at alternatives, I've been a user of searxng for awhile and have found it to be pretty solid.
backscratches
Submit a query to a random instance via https://searx.neocities.org (which is set as my homepage).
mac-attack
Mullvad Leta was an engine of choice within SearXNG for my self-hosted instance. Disappointed to see it go.
mkatx
Damn.. I just learned about this.
charcircuit
>Similar privacy can be achieved through the combination of a VPN and a privacy-focused browser.
Mullvad sell a VPN and privacy-focused browser so how are they unable to proxy the searches themselves? They already have the needed tools developed.
It always seemed like Leta was on thin ice since it queried Googles Search API and then cached the results for 30 days, which I think is against Googles TOS. I wonder if they finally noticed and got mad.
https://developers.google.com/terms
> you will not [...] keep cached copies longer than permitted by the cache header