4 ms·

>Which is silly, IMO. What did this addon actually do, besides be installed without user consent? 1) Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push

>Which is silly, IMO. What did this addon actually do, besides be installed without user consent? 1) Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push addons without any kind of notification to the user that their browser behavior has been patched. 2) Demonstrated (allegedly) that there are privacy and security related preferences in Firefox that are reverting themselves to less-safe defaults without user interaction, aka Microsoft preferences. 3) Demonstrated Mozilla's marketing department lacks the good sense to respect these capabilities for the loaded gun they are It's not about what they did, it's about what they could do. Mozilla doesn't need these tools, and these tools are dangerous. Why did they make them? Why shouldn't we ask Mozilla to remove them?

jotux 9y ago
>Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push addons without any kind of notification to the user that their browser behavior has been patched. If you allow firefox updates they can silently push any code on to your machine, right?
- itronitron 9y ago
  yes, and most people have grudgingly accepted the semi-weekly FF updates in order to receive the latest security updates... to hijack that update contract to push a marketing agenda is counter productive
- PurpleRamen 9y ago
  Updates are under public view, and users can trust that this process is hard to infiltrate. Silent addon-installations in the background, which appearently can be even pinpointed to specific usergroups, are not. Mozilla can anytime do anything on your system, without anyone watching them, and people just learned the hard way about it.
JoshTriplett 9y ago
> 3) Demonstrated Mozilla's marketing department lacks the good sense to respect these capabilities for the loaded gun they are This is the most critical issue, by far. Apparently nobody ran this by any reasonable person or went through any reasonable review process before shipping it.
- weaksauce 9y ago
  They may have some naive people running things. when you have millions of people running your software stuff like this tends to blow up. I personally don't see it as a huge issue of a breach of trust but I don't fault people for being mad about it. This is nowhere near the level of naiveté that google had when they had a real name policy for some of their services that outed dissidents, LGBTQ people, and other marginalized people. Not even the same ballpark. If Mozilla really wanted to do something nefarious or bad they could have added things into the codebase directly instead of as an adjunct. I still trust Mozilla personally and I believe they are a net benefit to the internet.
Yoric 9y ago
> 1) Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push addons without any kind of notification to the user that their browser behavior has been patched. Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? > 2) Demonstrated (allegedly) that there are privacy and security related preferences in Firefox that are reverting themselves to less-safe defaults without user interaction, aka Microsoft preferences. If that's the case, it's a bug. Bugs happen. Regardless, doesn't seem happen > 3) Demonstrated Mozilla's marketing department lacks the good sense to respect these capabilities for the loaded gun they are Fair enough, to some extent. > It's not about what they did, it's about what they could do. Mozilla doesn't need these tools, and these tools are dangerous. Why did they make them? Why shouldn't we ask Mozilla to remove them? Wait, what? Why does Mozilla have tools to distribute code? Because Mozilla uses it regularly to fix issues. This has been the case since Firefox 1.0, I assume. Why does Mozilla have tools that handles and/or updates and/or forgets preferences? Because preferences can't be handled anywhere else, since they are preferences for Mozilla tools. I haven't heard of preferences being force-changed until now, with the exception of fighting malware and switching stuff from experimental to mainstream. But, yeah, bugs happen. Why does Mozilla have a marketing department? I assume that's not a real question.
- Sir_Substance 9y ago
  >Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? Via an updater that pops up a little window showing you Mozilla is installing stuff, or via an apt-get/yum/whatever command. Point is, it is (and should be) visible when Mozilla is pushing code.
- ajnin 9y ago
  > Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? The difference is that in one case the updates are released following a public process, with bugzilla entries, proper review and engineering practices, while in the other case it's pushed with no oversight, secretly, by some guy in marketing. It's like Google Tab Manager in your browser. Browsers are too sensitive, too central in people's lives nowadays to allow such things.

jotux 9y ago

>Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push addons without any kind of notification to the user that their browser behavior has been patched. If you allow firefox updates they can silently push any code on to your machine, right?

itronitron 9y ago
yes, and most people have grudgingly accepted the semi-weekly FF updates in order to receive the latest security updates... to hijack that update contract to push a marketing agenda is counter productive
PurpleRamen 9y ago
Updates are under public view, and users can trust that this process is hard to infiltrate. Silent addon-installations in the background, which appearently can be even pinpointed to specific usergroups, are not. Mozilla can anytime do anything on your system, without anyone watching them, and people just learned the hard way about it.

JoshTriplett 9y ago

> 3) Demonstrated Mozilla's marketing department lacks the good sense to respect these capabilities for the loaded gun they are This is the most critical issue, by far. Apparently nobody ran this by any reasonable person or went through any reasonable review process before shipping it.

weaksauce 9y ago
They may have some naive people running things. when you have millions of people running your software stuff like this tends to blow up. I personally don't see it as a huge issue of a breach of trust but I don't fault people for being mad about it. This is nowhere near the level of naiveté that google had when they had a real name policy for some of their services that outed dissidents, LGBTQ people, and other marginalized people. Not even the same ballpark. If Mozilla really wanted to do something nefarious or bad they could have added things into the codebase directly instead of as an adjunct. I still trust Mozilla personally and I believe they are a net benefit to the internet.

Yoric 9y ago

> 1) Demonstrated that Mozilla has the ability to silently push addons without any kind of notification to the user that their browser behavior has been patched. Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? > 2) Demonstrated (allegedly) that there are privacy and security related preferences in Firefox that are reverting themselves to less-safe defaults without user interaction, aka Microsoft preferences. If that's the case, it's a bug. Bugs happen. Regardless, doesn't seem happen > 3) Demonstrated Mozilla's marketing department lacks the good sense to respect these capabilities for the loaded gun they are Fair enough, to some extent. > It's not about what they did, it's about what they could do. Mozilla doesn't need these tools, and these tools are dangerous. Why did they make them? Why shouldn't we ask Mozilla to remove them? Wait, what? Why does Mozilla have tools to distribute code? Because Mozilla uses it regularly to fix issues. This has been the case since Firefox 1.0, I assume. Why does Mozilla have tools that handles and/or updates and/or forgets preferences? Because preferences can't be handled anywhere else, since they are preferences for Mozilla tools. I haven't heard of preferences being force-changed until now, with the exception of fighting malware and switching stuff from experimental to mainstream. But, yeah, bugs happen. Why does Mozilla have a marketing department? I assume that's not a real question.

Sir_Substance 9y ago
>Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? Via an updater that pops up a little window showing you Mozilla is installing stuff, or via an apt-get/yum/whatever command. Point is, it is (and should be) visible when Mozilla is pushing code.
ajnin 9y ago
> Wait, did someone assume that Mozilla didn't have this ability? How did people think that they got security updates? The difference is that in one case the updates are released following a public process, with bugzilla entries, proper review and engineering practices, while in the other case it's pushed with no oversight, secretly, by some guy in marketing. It's like Google Tab Manager in your browser. Browsers are too sensitive, too central in people's lives nowadays to allow such things.