They sell clicks, but non-tracked, non-invasive keyword clicks. Which of course means a search for iphone 11 will have some paid ads to click on.

As they've built their user base on privacy and those unhappy with Google, it's very unlikely the user base would shrug and carry on if DDG switch to Google mode tracking with all the dubious extras of data collection, and retargeting etc. Not that it's going to work though, as DDG have um, DDG search. No platform, no phone, no analytics, home speaker, fonts, domain registry, email etc, ad nauseum. So where to collect the data until they're a FANG monster with a finger in every pie?

So we either see it coming a long time off, or DDG become a privacy focused monster with fingers in lots of privacy aware pies. Or stay as just DDG privacy friendly search.