15 ms·

I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the begi

I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the beginning. They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. They don't even do the server side, but just resell Mullvad's infrastructure with their brand. I'm already a Mullvad customer, and if I were to switch to Mozilla VPN: * It would not be available in my country (Germany) right away * I would have to join a waitlist * I would have to pay with my credit card, instead of cash-by-mail. (Great privacy improvement! /s) * I would have to use Mozilla's GUI instead of the wg-quick CLI. (The use of wg-quick is documented by Mullvad in addition to Mullvad's GUI, but I haven't found any wg-quick documentation on Mozilla VPN) All of this for the same infrastructure, the same service (number of devices, ...) at the same price. What the hell are you doing Mozilla?!

Black101 6y ago
If Mullvad doesn't know who the customers are, that would be the only possible upside?
- Cu3PO42 6y ago
  But they don't really know that anyway. Your account is just a number and when you mail cash you include a token that they can tie to your account number. Obviously they could log your IP address (which they promise not to), but that's an issue even if you go through Mozilla to purchase the service.
  - jdiez17 6y ago
    I wonder if the cash-by-mail payment option creates some kind of legal liability for Mullvad. If it suddenly became very popular, I would imagine the financial authorities would be rather unsatisfied with "oh, we receive a bunch of cash from anonymous customers by mail, nothing dodgy here..."
Fergusonb 6y ago
If you're using mullvad you have likely already done a lot of research on which provider you want to use. A lot of consumers are interested in a quality VPN but wouldn't do this kind of research. Mozilla provide additional eyeballs and billing support, and mullvad provides the service itself. It's a mutually beneficial transaction. They're not in competition for your money, they're targeting different demographics.
- lucideer 6y ago
  > they're targeting different demographics This is the question though: who are these demographics? I know Mozilla likely have a lot more data on this than I, but who is using Firefox / interested enough in Mozilla to read their marketing & research their VPN offerings, but is simultaneously not someone who would research VPN providers in general / use Mullvad? What is this techie/non-techie interested/not-interested hybrid person?
  - ruined 6y ago
    that demographic is huge. most people under 40 today have grown up watching the surveillance industry establish itself, and those with any consciousness of their own vulnerability want to take action to minimize their surface area. until recently that's been extremely difficult and technical, but now firefox with container extensions, adblockers, and a VPN are all easily approachable for the average person, and they're all under one brand.
    - hu3 6y ago
      > that demographic is huge. I just asked "who knows what VPN means" in IM group of non tech savvy folks, most under 35. No one knows. Perhaps among us Firefox users that's different but certainly "most people under 40 today" wouldn't know even what VPN means.
      - ficklepickle 6y ago
        Just about anybody that watches YouTube regularly knows what a VPN is. Even very mainstream, non-tech channels have been sponsored by VPN companies. It has died down a bit now, but it was insane for a while. A constant flow of sketchy VPN companies. VPNs are heavily marketed to regular consumers these days. Mostly for region shifting or vague privacy/security benefits.
baseballdork 6y ago
I was also a mullvad customer and wanted to switch to Mozilla VPN specifically because it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser. At the time they didn't support linux at all, but someone wrote a tool[0] to squirt out the necessary configs to use with wg-quick. When I saw that, I pulled the trigger and haven't looked back. [0] https://github.com/NilsIrl/MozWire https://github.com/NilsIrl/MozWire
- lucideer 6y ago
  > it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser Is this the case? Is income from Mozilla VPN put toward Firefox development? If it is, that info should be front-and-centre; they'd have a lot more customers I think.
  - snark42 6y ago
    It supports Mozilla. Browser is pretty important, but they do other things like Rust. https://wiki.mozilla.org/Projects/Complete https://wiki.mozilla.org/Projects/Complete
    - lucideer 6y ago
      "Mozilla" is a complicated entity, and quite a lot of their funds go toward projects unrelated to Firefox (to the chagrin of many Firefox users as much of the donor goodwill toward Mozilla Foundation as an entity comes from Firefox). There may be some clues in their public accounts but I guess VPN is too new a product to appear their yet https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/
IgorPartola 6y ago
I signed up for Mozilla VPN instead of Mullvad for a two reasons: 1. It was priced in USD. 2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts.
- jorvi 6y ago
  > 2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts. This is something Mulvad has been doing since 2009.. https://mullvad.net/en/pricing https://mullvad.net/en/pricing
  - IgorPartola 6y ago
    Ah yes, that's correct. My bad, I confused them with someone else I was also looking at, at the time.
  - Ir0nMan 6y ago
    4.99 USD vs 5 Euro (5.87 USD) would make Mozilla VPN 15% cheaper than Mullvad.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
wnevets 6y ago
> They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. That has been enough for me. I generally trust Mozilla when they say privacy first and if I'm going to give my money to a VPN provider I rather give it to Mozilla than say NordVPN.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
dewey 6y ago
It's as simple as that: You are not the target group. If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product they get a million results, all with different deals and they'd have to figure out how to find the best one and will still be around in a year. If they already trust the Mozilla brand they'll go with that. Just like people go with stock apps on their computer over some maybe better third party app.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product they [...] have to figure out how to find the best one and will still be around in a year. Yep! It's a Mozilla product, so there's no guesswork and no worry. You know it won't be around in a year!
duxup 6y ago
I like Mullvad and supporting Mozilla.
unethical_ban 6y ago
>They bring their brand name To someone who isn't a leet hacker or SW dev, that is the ball game. Firefox and Mozilla aren't household, but millions of less-technical people know of them. Rather than getting their VPN (if they even know the value proposition) from some podcast advertisement, Mozilla is saying "Hey, this kind of service gives you privacy and we stand behind it". I use it upon occasion. It's dead simple to purchase, set up on any OS and I trust Mozilla not to send me to a shady backend. If you already have VPN and they don't offer it in your country, they clearly aren't targeting you.
jraph 6y ago
> It would not be available in my country (Germany) right away You could use a VPN to make it look like you are in a supported country.
Iv 6y ago
> They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. Isn't it the most important thing for a VPN provider? You want a company that is privacy-conscious, not one that logs your traffic and sells it or open it to the various TLAs of the world.
skinkestek 6y ago
> I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation. This way at least they pass through the hands of the organization that does the most important work. (Nothing against the other issues but right now the browser should be their top priority and I was massively annoyed when I found that donations towards the foundation couldn't be used for browser development and the browser.)
- acatton 6y ago
  > Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation. But is it going towards Browser development though? https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html Or is it going towards executive salaries?
  - skinkestek 6y ago
    What do you suppose we do in the meantime then? I have a hard time coming up with an alternative that isn't just playing the ball into the hands of Google so that they can kill ad blocking right away?
passivate 6y ago
>I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the beginning. They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. They don't even do the server side, but just resell Mullvad's infrastructure with their brand. The incentive for you is that Mozilla will keep Mullvad under close watch and make sure promises are kept - so you don't have to. Furthermore, there is no limitation for Mozilla to not seek other partnerships and/or develop the server side service themselves - they have the in-house dev talent to do so. So, yes, they do bring quite a lot to the table besides their brand name.
miniyarov 6y ago
If anyone wants to have a mobile app that creates VPN on DigitalOcean, AWS or GCP checkout ZudVPN.com (https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN) Completely transparent server cloud init: https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN/blob/master/src/providers/DigitalOcean/cloudconfig.tsx https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN/blob/master/src/providers/D...
givemeanaccount 6y ago
>* I would have to pay with my credit card, instead of cash-by-mail. (Great privacy improvement! /s) Do you download your configurations from the Mullvad website over Tor via their onion service 100% of the time? Do you connect to Tor before connecting to Mullvad in your VPN client?
- acatton 6y ago
  "IP" is a much more private datapoint than "Credit card number" and "First name, Last Name". I'm not afraid of governments knowing who/what I do. I'm afraid of private companies holding private data about me.
dathinab 6y ago
If you don't know anything about VPN's and are unlikely to (have time, motivation to) do a lot of research then you might trust Moziala/Firefox more then some unknown company-named Mullvad.
chiefalchemist 6y ago
Easy steady revenue is not a bad thing. Fwiw, I'm considering switching just to show some support for Mozilla. I suspect that if they get enough traction they'll roll their own. Until then reselling was a quick and simple way to get going.
hendersoon 6y ago
It's slightly cheaper than Mullvad, in the US. €5 is $5.88, and Mozilla is available for $5.00/month.

Black101 6y ago

If Mullvad doesn't know who the customers are, that would be the only possible upside?

Cu3PO42 6y ago
But they don't really know that anyway. Your account is just a number and when you mail cash you include a token that they can tie to your account number. Obviously they could log your IP address (which they promise not to), but that's an issue even if you go through Mozilla to purchase the service.
- jdiez17 6y ago
  I wonder if the cash-by-mail payment option creates some kind of legal liability for Mullvad. If it suddenly became very popular, I would imagine the financial authorities would be rather unsatisfied with "oh, we receive a bunch of cash from anonymous customers by mail, nothing dodgy here..."

Fergusonb 6y ago

If you're using mullvad you have likely already done a lot of research on which provider you want to use. A lot of consumers are interested in a quality VPN but wouldn't do this kind of research. Mozilla provide additional eyeballs and billing support, and mullvad provides the service itself. It's a mutually beneficial transaction. They're not in competition for your money, they're targeting different demographics.

lucideer 6y ago
> they're targeting different demographics This is the question though: who are these demographics? I know Mozilla likely have a lot more data on this than I, but who is using Firefox / interested enough in Mozilla to read their marketing & research their VPN offerings, but is simultaneously not someone who would research VPN providers in general / use Mullvad? What is this techie/non-techie interested/not-interested hybrid person?
- ruined 6y ago
  that demographic is huge. most people under 40 today have grown up watching the surveillance industry establish itself, and those with any consciousness of their own vulnerability want to take action to minimize their surface area. until recently that's been extremely difficult and technical, but now firefox with container extensions, adblockers, and a VPN are all easily approachable for the average person, and they're all under one brand.
  - hu3 6y ago
    > that demographic is huge. I just asked "who knows what VPN means" in IM group of non tech savvy folks, most under 35. No one knows. Perhaps among us Firefox users that's different but certainly "most people under 40 today" wouldn't know even what VPN means.
    - ficklepickle 6y ago
      Just about anybody that watches YouTube regularly knows what a VPN is. Even very mainstream, non-tech channels have been sponsored by VPN companies. It has died down a bit now, but it was insane for a while. A constant flow of sketchy VPN companies. VPNs are heavily marketed to regular consumers these days. Mostly for region shifting or vague privacy/security benefits.

baseballdork 6y ago

I was also a mullvad customer and wanted to switch to Mozilla VPN specifically because it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser. At the time they didn't support linux at all, but someone wrote a tool[0] to squirt out the necessary configs to use with wg-quick. When I saw that, I pulled the trigger and haven't looked back. [0] https://github.com/NilsIrl/MozWire https://github.com/NilsIrl/MozWire

lucideer 6y ago
> it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser Is this the case? Is income from Mozilla VPN put toward Firefox development? If it is, that info should be front-and-centre; they'd have a lot more customers I think.
- snark42 6y ago
  It supports Mozilla. Browser is pretty important, but they do other things like Rust. https://wiki.mozilla.org/Projects/Complete https://wiki.mozilla.org/Projects/Complete
  - lucideer 6y ago
    "Mozilla" is a complicated entity, and quite a lot of their funds go toward projects unrelated to Firefox (to the chagrin of many Firefox users as much of the donor goodwill toward Mozilla Foundation as an entity comes from Firefox). There may be some clues in their public accounts but I guess VPN is too new a product to appear their yet https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/foundation/annualreport/2019/

IgorPartola 6y ago

I signed up for Mozilla VPN instead of Mullvad for a two reasons: 1. It was priced in USD. 2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts.

jorvi 6y ago
> 2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts. This is something Mulvad has been doing since 2009.. https://mullvad.net/en/pricing https://mullvad.net/en/pricing
- IgorPartola 6y ago
  Ah yes, that's correct. My bad, I confused them with someone else I was also looking at, at the time.
- Ir0nMan 6y ago
  4.99 USD vs 5 Euro (5.87 USD) would make Mozilla VPN 15% cheaper than Mullvad.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

wnevets 6y ago

> They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. That has been enough for me. I generally trust Mozilla when they say privacy first and if I'm going to give my money to a VPN provider I rather give it to Mozilla than say NordVPN.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

dewey 6y ago

It's as simple as that: You are not the target group. If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product they get a million results, all with different deals and they'd have to figure out how to find the best one and will still be around in a year. If they already trust the Mozilla brand they'll go with that. Just like people go with stock apps on their computer over some maybe better third party app.

JohnBooty 6y ago
If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product they [...] have to figure out how to find the best one and will still be around in a year. Yep! It's a Mozilla product, so there's no guesswork and no worry. You know it won't be around in a year!

duxup 6y ago

I like Mullvad and supporting Mozilla.

unethical_ban 6y ago

>They bring their brand name To someone who isn't a leet hacker or SW dev, that is the ball game. Firefox and Mozilla aren't household, but millions of less-technical people know of them. Rather than getting their VPN (if they even know the value proposition) from some podcast advertisement, Mozilla is saying "Hey, this kind of service gives you privacy and we stand behind it". I use it upon occasion. It's dead simple to purchase, set up on any OS and I trust Mozilla not to send me to a shady backend. If you already have VPN and they don't offer it in your country, they clearly aren't targeting you.

jraph 6y ago

> It would not be available in my country (Germany) right away You could use a VPN to make it look like you are in a supported country.

Iv 6y ago

> They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. Isn't it the most important thing for a VPN provider? You want a company that is privacy-conscious, not one that logs your traffic and sells it or open it to the various TLAs of the world.

skinkestek 6y ago

> I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation. This way at least they pass through the hands of the organization that does the most important work. (Nothing against the other issues but right now the browser should be their top priority and I was massively annoyed when I found that donations towards the foundation couldn't be used for browser development and the browser.)

acatton 6y ago
> Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation. But is it going towards Browser development though? https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html Or is it going towards executive salaries?
- skinkestek 6y ago
  What do you suppose we do in the meantime then? I have a hard time coming up with an alternative that isn't just playing the ball into the hands of Google so that they can kill ad blocking right away?

passivate 6y ago

>I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the beginning. They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. They don't even do the server side, but just resell Mullvad's infrastructure with their brand. The incentive for you is that Mozilla will keep Mullvad under close watch and make sure promises are kept - so you don't have to. Furthermore, there is no limitation for Mozilla to not seek other partnerships and/or develop the server side service themselves - they have the in-house dev talent to do so. So, yes, they do bring quite a lot to the table besides their brand name.

miniyarov 6y ago

If anyone wants to have a mobile app that creates VPN on DigitalOcean, AWS or GCP checkout ZudVPN.com (https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN) Completely transparent server cloud init: https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN/blob/master/src/providers/DigitalOcean/cloudconfig.tsx https://github.com/zudvpn/ZudVPN/blob/master/src/providers/D...

givemeanaccount 6y ago

>* I would have to pay with my credit card, instead of cash-by-mail. (Great privacy improvement! /s) Do you download your configurations from the Mullvad website over Tor via their onion service 100% of the time? Do you connect to Tor before connecting to Mullvad in your VPN client?

acatton 6y ago
"IP" is a much more private datapoint than "Credit card number" and "First name, Last Name". I'm not afraid of governments knowing who/what I do. I'm afraid of private companies holding private data about me.

dathinab 6y ago

If you don't know anything about VPN's and are unlikely to (have time, motivation to) do a lot of research then you might trust Moziala/Firefox more then some unknown company-named Mullvad.

chiefalchemist 6y ago

Easy steady revenue is not a bad thing. Fwiw, I'm considering switching just to show some support for Mozilla. I suspect that if they get enough traction they'll roll their own. Until then reselling was a quick and simple way to get going.

hendersoon 6y ago

It's slightly cheaper than Mullvad, in the US. €5 is $5.88, and Mozilla is available for $5.00/month.