3 ms·

I always suspected Mozilla pushed Do Not Track to undermine online privacy. It was a doomed idea from the start -- all DNT does is politely ask a website not t

I always suspected Mozilla pushed Do Not Track to undermine online privacy. It was a doomed idea from the start -- all DNT does is politely ask a website not to track you. Setting their browser to DNT on did give tens of millions of Firefox users the illusion they were getting a high level of privacy (so they presumably would stick to Firefox) even though it didn't actually do very much.

Chaebixi 9y ago
> I always suspected Mozilla pushed Do Not Track to undermine online privacy. What motivation does Mozilla have to want to "undermine online privacy?" Of all the major browser vendors, they seem the least coupled to the privacy-invading ad ecosystem.
- theprop 9y ago
  The Mozilla that was using your browsing history to target new tab page ads to you? That's "least" coupled to the privacy-invading ecosystem? That gets hundreds of millions of dollars a year from Google & Yahoo/Microsoft in search revenues without pushing them to provide a genuine private search?
  - Chaebixi 9y ago
    > The Mozilla that was using your browsing history to target new tab page ads to you? That's "least" coupled to the privacy-invading ecosystem? Yeah it's the least coupled, because the major alternatives (e.g. Google) literally run the privacy-invading ad networks. Mozilla walked back from the tab-page ads more than a year ago. > without pushing them to provide a genuine private search? How much leverage do you think Mozilla has with the search engines? Google canceled their deal with them because they are so dominant and Chrome has been so successful. Mozilla needs revenue to keep the lights on, and the search engines are the source of it.