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Disable telemetry and data collection in mozilla Firefox Quantum (2018)
- rndgermandude 6y agoIs there anything these preferences disable that isn't disabled by unchecking the three boxes (telemetry, experiments, crash reports) in the regular Privacy & Security tab of the Firefox preferences?
- gostsamo 6y agoFF has a default link that it checks for capture portals on wifi networks. I think that it must be turned on all the time, though something in the about: pages might turn it off.
- rndgermandude 6y agoRight, captivedetect.canonicalURL: http://detectportal.firefox.com/success.txt http://detectportal.firefox.com/success.txt Tho that isn't mentioned in the article, and I'd be surprised if mozilla collects any data there (other than something like a hit count). Of course, there are also the update checks, both for Firefox itself and extensions (both not mentioned in the article either, and probably a bad idea to disable this functionality unless some external source like a package manager does the updating for you).
- niyaven 6y ago> even after you disable these options, Firefox still collects and sends data to servers I am surprised, for a product that claims to be privacy focused to behave in this way. I am a Firefox user and have not disabled telemetry since I think it can help Firefox and I trust them no to do anything wrong with it. But I would have expected that unchecking the telemetry option would actually disable telemetry.
- eitland 6y agoI know there are a lot of people hanging around here looking for a business idea or a side project with some potential, so here's one idea: Create a customized version of Firefox that: - has support for removing the top bar when tst or something similar is installed. It should probably be possible to disable/reneable it using a menu option and an optional toolbar button. - actually disables all telemetry when you try to disable telemetry - optional but recommended: a "getting started wizard" where you select your preferred search engine, if you want to install TST or Sidebery, and if you want to set memory consumption to sane defaults. - otherwise works exactly like Firefox - Charge $50 a year, possibly more. I'd probably sign up immediately. Questions: Q: what if Mozilla finally gets it and implements this? A: Fine, just go to the next thing they broke.
- m463 6y agoAlthough I haven't used them - there are several other firefox forks like waterfox or the tor browser that support privacy/anonymity waterfox claims: * Telemetry is removed * Data collection is removed tor goes much further
- eitland 6y agoI've tried those a couple of years ago, but aren't they still based on older versions of Firefox? My idea here was taking the latest version of Firefox and just fix the worst problems. I'd still pay for it.
- jamienicol 6y agoSeems like someone would earn exactly $50 from doing that
- eitland 6y agoI can't be the only one to miss old Firefox features and UX without wanting to leave behind all improvements we've seen the last few years on security, support for new standards and also performance.
- ForHackernews 6y agoOoh, now do Chrome!
- corty 6y agoQuite impossible without extensive sourcecode changes. Where FF has extensive user-configurable flags in about:config, Chrome is just a totally unconfigurable blob.
- 0xy 6y agoThere's a reason X-Client-Data telemetry being sent to DoubleClick servers in Chrome browsers is undisclosed to users, hard coded and impossible to disable.
- underdeserver 6y agoMozilla people - this is a serious issue. If you want to champion privacy, you NEED to have a big red button that says "nothing gets sent out" and you NEED to have an end-to-end test to make sure Firefox respects it.
- hajhatten 6y agoAgreed. This is probably one of the fastest way to loose users in 2020.
- thanhvotuan 6y agoagree
- Fnoord 6y agoArticle is from January 2018.
- mtgx 6y agoAnd Mozilla has lost a lot of users since then. Coincide? I think not.
- Rexxar 6y agoI'm all for this functionality but if the said users go to Chrome because "Firefox has no privacy" this is ridiculous. Firefox is our best browser in this domain, let's not kill it by complaining indefinitely on it.
- account42 6y ago> Firefox is our best browser in this domain Best is irrelevant - it's not good enough.
- lorenzhs 6y agoWhat are you going to switch to? Chrome? Sure, it would be nice to have an easy switch that disables all telemetry, but let's not forget that every other major browsers collects far more data, and the most popular browser steers you toward to storing your entire web and location history on their servers as soon as you log into your email account. Kinda puts non-identifying information about Firefox's performance into perspective, doesn't it?
- calcifer 6y agoNeeds (2018) in the title.
- Deukhoofd 6y agoDoes anyone know if this is still an issue in 2020?
- 02020202 6y agoinstall wireshark and see for yourself
- Aachen 6y agoIt is. Telemetry turned off, all URLs removed from about:config, still making requests to "buckets/monitor/collections/changes/records" at the domain firefox.settings.services.mozilla.com (spotted this one in my proxy while trying to do a website audit).
- Deukhoofd 6y agoAre you certain that is related to telemetry, and not a request for one of Firefox's other services?
- Aachen 6y agoIt constantly pings the servers with my IP address, timestamp, and user agent if nothing else. They can see where people are over time. I was busy so haven't looked into what it's sending (just exempted the domain from interception for the duration of the audit), but in the EU and IP address with timestamp is personally identifiable information.
- forgotmypw17 6y agoIf I let someone into my space and they carry out a bunch of shit, they,re not coming back in ...
- kaba0 6y agoThen let a bunch of rabid wild animals in your place, as that is what the only alternative is (every chromium based browser). Also, it is a click-bait, out of date article without much truth to it, don’t believe everything you read online
- stoobs 6y agoWas this fixed given that the story is from 2018?
- smarnach 6y agoI don't think the claim that Firefox sends telemetry even after disabling it in the preferences has ever been true. It will still contact Mozilla servers for other reasons, like retrieving lists of malicious add-ons or checking for updates, but it won't send telemetry.
- csande17 6y agoHere's an example of Firefox sending telemetry even after users disabled telemetry: https://www.ghacks.net/2018/09/21/mozilla-wants-to-estimate-firefoxs-telemetry-off-population/ https://www.ghacks.net/2018/09/21/mozilla-wants-to-estimate-...
- jamienicol 6y agoThere's a lovely irony in that article being littered with double click ads
- account42 6y agoAt least those can be blocked by extensions.
- m463 6y agoFirefox is lame in this respect. I've gone through countless iterations trying to turn stuff off, but it still makes all kinds of requests. I had to block it with Little Snitch. On the other hand, plenty of other "privacy focused" companies are worse (apple is horrendous).
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- underdeserver 6y agoArticle is from 2018 (thanks Fnoord)!
- privacyonsec 6y agoAlright, this is a click bait, misleading title, the title should be: "How to disable all telemetry and data collection in mozilla Firefox Quantum"
- mkl 6y agoIt doesn't seem like click bait or misleading [1]. Maybe it's changed in the last few minutes? Adding "How to" and messing with the capitalisation doesn't seem like an improvement. [1] Currently "Disable All Telemetry and Data Collection in Mozilla Firefox Quantum"
- privacyonsec 6y agoThe point is hadding "how to" nothing about capitalization ..
- 02020202 6y agono wonder world governments are going totalitarian. people are not willing to fight for their freedoms and privacy even online when all you need to do is few clicks. ffs. also ff is paid for by gulag anyway so there is no difference if your data is collected directly or via 3rd party(mozilla).
- mkl 6y agoTo see what the telemetry actually entails, go to about:telemetry. It looks like enough for fingerprinting, but doesn't seem to include websites visited. A bit more info here: https://www.zdnet.com/article/firefox-now-shows-what-telemetry-data-its-collecting-about-you/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/firefox-now-shows-what-telemet...
- huhtenberg 6y ago> It looks like enough for fingerprinting No fingerprinting required. Telemetry > General Data > Id is a GUID. ClientID is also a GUID. You can clear the latter in about:config and it sticks, but clearing the former causes it to be regenerated on the restart.
- Aachen 6y ago> doesn't seem to include websites visited I mean, that would be China++ level surveillance. Of course it doesn't include what sites you visited.
- mkl 6y agoOf course, but some people seem to be reacting as if that's what's happening, and knowing which sites problems occurred on would be useful for a browser vendor to know.
- Mike_Jordan 6y agoAny idea why option to edit 'toolkit.telemetry.enabled' is disabled? https://i.imgur.com/DCLiMZh.png https://i.imgur.com/DCLiMZh.png
- rndgermandude 6y agoYes, read: https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/toolkit/components/telemetry/internals/preferences.html https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/toolkit/components/t... That preference has nothing to do with actually sending data to the mothership: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25057424 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25057424
- thristian 6y agoA related anecdote: Firefox disabled ALSA support because their telemetry showed nobody was using it, but it turned out that the kind of people who use ALSA are also the kind of people who disable as much telemetry as possible: https://chuttenblog.wordpress.com/2020/11/05/data-science-is-hard-alsa-in-firefox/ https://chuttenblog.wordpress.com/2020/11/05/data-science-is... Disabling telemetry is like refusing to register to vote: you minimise the chance of people doing bad things to you, but you also minimise the chance of people doing good things for you. Maybe that trade-off is worth it for you, maybe it isn't, but don't complain that the trade-off exists and don't get annoyed that other people choose differently.
- Aachen 6y agoMore like refusing to vote if it can't be done anonymously. That said, I have telemetry turned on in my personal browser because I trust Mozilla not to abuse my data. At work I handle more sensitive data and there it's turned off (the basic stuff, without diving into about:config to make it completely silent). On the other extreme, I also use Firefox during security assessments. My browser making noise on a network where I'm not supposed to be detected is not something I can have happen. Removing all URLs and disabling all telemetry settings in about:config used to be enough, but recently they added a new system and that URL doesn't seem to be in about:config, I guess it's hard-coded. With covid-19 our on-site assessments are on hold anyway, but sooner or later I'll need to disable that either in Firefox itself or in the proxy configuration (on localhost, which logs any requests I make).
- calcifer 6y ago> More like refusing to vote if it can't be done anonymously. It's already anonymous, no? Of course if you consider a CGNAT IP address not-anonymous then nothing can help you.
- Aachen 6y agoThe definition of personally identifiable information, as I recall it, is info for which there exists a party that can trace it back to a person. Just because I can't find your name using your social security number doesn't mean that your SSN is not PII, because there exists a party that knows whom this SSN belongs to. Similarly, it's not as if CGNAT is an anonymisation technology. Crooks would love it: download and upload whatever you want and nobody can ever tell it was you! No, ISPs log who used which IP and port at which time. Processing the IP address and port number is essential for TCP to work, and even if you don't store it and filter it on your network's edge, it's still covered by privacy law–technically. A judge might not award you damages, but technically the processing (not storage) of personal data is also covered by privacy laws. Of course, if they don't store it then I would consider it anonymous. The question to me is what they do with the data. But it's not correct to assume that it's anonymous just because you share an IP address with others, or to assume that everyone has CGNAT. Where I live a personal address is the default.