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Oh. Bigger story here appears to be that the proposal is publicly editable and has already been vandalized. I'm not going to link to it, but I will say that I'm

Oh. Bigger story here appears to be that the proposal is publicly editable and has already been vandalized. I'm not going to link to it, but I will say that I'm not thrilled that Mozilla is handling proposals using these formats/hosting choices. So much of this feels weird to me. I don't understand how I'm supposed to take Mozilla partnering with Facebook, I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard or that it would ever do anything other than try to weaken the standard. I can't read up on the IPA standard because the link is currently being vandalized, so I can't really comment on that, but this is dangerous ground to tread and also I vaguely feel like as a user I might want to not have ads attributed across devices. Before anybody jumps in and yells about how Mozilla is worse than Google, let me point out that Firefox is still objectively the best browser to use for privacy right now. But crud this announcement is weird and vaguely tone-deaf and doesn't make me feel good, and I think at the very least it should have been worded less as a celebration, or at least should have spent more time going into why I shouldn't feel uncomfortable about the whole thing. It's potentially a longer conversation, but the article also doesn't really make a strong case for why I should be rooting for a privacy-respecting system for advertisers in the first place.

strulovich 5y ago
> I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard or that it would ever do anything other than try to weaken the standard. I don’t think that’s why you want FB/Meta here. But you want to make sure this is useful enough for the ad companies so this actually becomes a solution. If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just wasting time. Assuming the competition is standard built by Google within itself, this makes sense. (Meta employee, don’t work on ads, opinions my own)
- MereInterest 5y ago
  > If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just waiting time. Which is why regulation is needed. Otherwise, any solution needs to be more attractive to the advertisers than the people they stalk (i.e. everybody else).
  - ahmed_ds 5y ago
    Is it me or these days major tech non profits feels marginally less of an advocate of privacy related matters compared EU as a whole? TBH I think GNU failed to make any sort of progress in terms of privacy because their ideology was always on the extremist side. And all the rest of the NGO's kept compromising to meet demands of big tech. Then you have the EU, who will just slap fines without compromising at all. Moreover lobbying runs US govt. Tech non profits are financed largely by megacorps so they won't necessarily bite the hand that feed them.
- dessant 5y ago
  We can just outlaw certain types of tracking, your employer does not need to be given a seat at the table, nor does it deserve one. Meta will happily use any data they can access about people, and this will just be an additional data point that augments the extensive behavioral profiles they have on most internet users. This is yet another attempt to not accept no for an answer when it comes to data collection, because not getting any data on users who refused data collection is unfathomable to them.
- danShumway 5y ago
  > But you want to make sure this is useful enough for the ad companies so this actually becomes a solution. I guess the question though is: is Facebook going to stop delivering ads if the solution isn't good enough? Why is it important that Facebook like the system? Facebook was very upset about Apple's privacy changes, it didn't get rid of ads on iOS. It's been very upset about a lot of things. What throws me in these conversations is that I'm not sure why the solution has to be one that Facebook is happy with. What Facebook would be happy with is as much data as they're allowed to have. And also, Facebook doesn't really have veto powers over what anyone else does, so it's not like we need to find a middle ground with the company. Part of the problem of building a solution that's good enough that advertisers won't want more is that it's difficult to believe that solution exists. Facebook is pretty clear that the constraints on what they'll collect is defined in their internal/public privacy policies, and within that constraint they will collect as much data as the platform offers. I'm not aware of any instances of a platform offering an ad attribution system that was privacy preserving, and having Facebook (or other companies) decide not to do any fingerprinting or insert any tracking links into pages, or use any cookies on that platform. I also find it really hard to believe that if Mozilla cracks down on fingerprinting and doesn't provide an alternative that Facebook is happy with, that Facebook will stop selling ads.
  - lisper 5y ago
    My Bayesian prior is that anything that upsets FB is almost certainly a good thing, and vice versa.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      Indeed, the more upset they are the more likely it is that a solution really works.
      - Accacin 5y ago
        Exactly. Remember Facebook taking out a spread in a newspaper saying Apple would kill small businesses because they couldn't advertise? And that solution by Apple seemed to actually work in many respects. I'm really fed up with Mozilla. I've always used and believed in them but this just feels so odd.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
  - dang 5y ago
    Would you please stop breaking the site guidelines, regardless of how strongly you feel about $topic? It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. We've already asked you repeatedly not to post flamewar comments on HN. Not cool. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - jefftk 5y ago
    > ad companies fuck off and die Does that include HN? Which is funded by an in-house advertising system with job ads that appear as sponsored posts?
- seanhunter 5y ago
  > If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just wasting time. Not really. I don't want any advertising company to use any information about me under any circumstances. Working towards that goal is not wasting my time.
- stingraycharles 5y ago
  Your point of view is diplomatic, but it rests on the assumption that you actually need cooperation from adtech in order to make a solution. As Apple has proven, this is simply not true: you just need the entities that control the browser / OS. This implies that it’s not “collaboration with adtech” that you want, but rather “collaboration with the biggest browser vendors”. Unfortunately the biggest browser is in hands of Google. Thus Google has a huge influence in this. But any other adtech company (including FB/meta) has no meaningful contribution.
- wintermutestwin 5y ago
  >(Meta employee, don’t work on ads, opinions my own) FB = ads. It is their business imperative. Even if you are a campus janitor, you are "working on ads."
cglong 5y ago
FWIW, you can choose to "View final document" which gets rid of all the proposed vandalism. Still really bad that the default view contains all the proposals.
jer0me 5y ago
For anyone looking, I’m sure they’ll revert it soon: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KpdSKD8-Rn0bWPTu4UtK54ks0yv2j22pA5SrAD9av4s/edit https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KpdSKD8-Rn0bWPTu4UtK54ks...
- danShumway 5y ago
  I understand why people use Google Docs, it's a very convenient platform. But this is a technical document about browser features, I'm a little frustrated that this is being coordinated over a proprietary SaaS service instead of over Git[0] with markdown or something. I think a lot more than that, I'm frustrated that the document is being made publicly available on that platform. When someone links to a web standard on Github, often it's because the standard is seeing active participation. For something that is being linked to a public view, I would have loved to see at least a PDF export or something. It's not that it's completely inexcusable, I'm sure Mozilla is making use of Google Doc features, markups, contribution history, whatever. It is just disappointing to see that apparently there isn't an Open collaboration platform that Mozilla thinks is good enough for this process, even a self-hosted one. It's not the biggest deal in the world, it just feels like a bad look to see Mozilla tout that it's built this great standard, and then click on the link and get sent to a Google Doc. I mean... this article is about privacy, if I'm currently signed into Google and I click on this link, does it mean anything that Google now knows I personally clicked on it? I know it's not the end of the world, but Mozilla literally just finished telling me how good it was at anonymizing data, and now it's leaking my reading habits to Google in an extremely targeted, de-anonymized form. ---- [0]: Yes, I know that many standards processes on the web use Github, which is also a proprietary SaaS, but at least the majority of that process (issue tracker aside) is usable just as an endpoint.
  - rascul 5y ago
    > It is just disappointing to see that apparently there isn't an Open collaboration platform that Mozilla thinks is good enough for this process, even a self-hosted one. Mozilla has been hosting an EtherPad instance for some time now, which may have worked in place of Google Docs for this. https://pad.mozilla.org https://pad.mozilla.org
sneak 5y ago
> I don't understand how I'm supposed to take Mozilla partnering with Facebook, I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard or that it would ever do anything other than try to weaken the standard. You should take it the exact same way as when: - Mozilla put proprietary, closed-source DRM (widevine) into their product - Mozilla put nonconsensual (opt-out) telemetry (aka spyware) into their product - Mozilla put Google backend services into their product - Mozilla put advertising/paid placement into their product The "Mozilla is about privacy and open standards" meme is a false one and has been for a long time. Actions speak a lot louder than words.
- btdmaster 5y ago
  This is correct for the most part, but please consider that Mozilla tried to stop DRM being standardised and only has it as an opt-in extension: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/drm-and-the-challenge-of-serving-users https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/drm-and-the-challenge-of...
- danShumway 5y ago
  Oh, come on. I did raise a stink over closed-source DRM, I raised a stink not just over Firefox adding it, I raised a stink over the entire web standards process. I have raised stinks about telemetry and advertising within Firefox. I've raised stinks about Pocket being purchased and not Open Sourced, and then integrated into the browser by default. I've raised stink about a lot of things. Nevertheless, it is still objectively true that Mozilla Firefox is the best mainstream browser right now for privacy, and anyone who argues otherwise is either not looking at the bigger picture or hasn't done much research into how companies do the majority of their tracking online. The privacy problems that Mozilla has had have objectively less impact on people's everyday privacy than Chromium's hobbled extension support. The ability to turn on anti-fingerprinting features uplifted from Tor is more important than whether or not Google search is enabled by default. Container-extensions are more practically impactful on everyday privacy than Pocket is. I am literally complaining about and criticizing Mozilla right now, and yet the immediate reaction is to jump on the one positive thing I said and act like I'm somehow ignoring Mozilla's other issues. I'm not ignoring those issues, but the "Mozilla is corrupt and no better than Google" meme is similarly completely ridiculous. Every single other browser on the market including DeGoogled Chromium and Safari are hobbled in ways that make them worse for privacy, and overall Mozilla still as a company has a better track record on fighting for privacy and building privacy-preserving tools than Google/Microsoft/Brave -- at least it has a better track record in the ways that matter. It is so frustrating to try and have a constructive conversation about real missteps that Mozilla is making when people view anything less than a complete condemnation of the company like that means they're being put on a pedestal. Mozilla isn't perfect, and it's clumsy and sometimes does outright bad stuff, and that is still consistent with them being one of the better corporate privacy advocates on the Internet.
BbzzbB 5y ago
>Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard I'm not saying "this is it", but here's a (IMO) reasonable line of thought why they would genuinely be working in that direction. Basically, short term pain for long term security. There is a clear preference by consumers for preserving privacy; the percentage of iOS users not allowing targeting since IDFA is proof. There is also political motivation for regulators to crack down on the wild west of online privacy in the US (FB scapegoating) and abroad (GDPR and co). If there is to be a hard turn by regulators and hardware/OS providers for privacy protection and FB does not prepare for it by preparing Audience Network to operate without granular personal data, their whole business model would be at risk and their terminal value threatened. Being prepared for a world placing privacy first protects their financial interests, likely even putting them ahead of competitors that are going in unprepared. If voting power at FB was majority owned by Wall Street shareholders, you could argue it's unlikely they would hurt operating income for years rather than milk it even if it's protective long term. But that's not the case, Mark does have a super majority and can afford governing for the long term even if it makes analysts critical.
thaumasiotes 5y ago
> I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard Well, the headline says "privacy preserving attribution for advertising". I'm guessing Facebook provides expertise in what kind of attribution advertisers want.
huhtenberg 5y ago
> Bigger story here It's not a bigger story. THE story - in fact, the REVELATION - here is that Mozilla thinks it's OK to cooperate with Facebook on PRIVACY work. You can't make this shit up. Not even on hard drugs.
- bun_at_work 5y ago
  As other commenters have pointed out, it makes sense to work with one of the two largest advertising firms when figuring out how to support their advertising needs, while maintaining user privacy. If Facebook doesn't use this method, the work towards private attribution that Mozilla is doing doesn't matter. Furthermore, Mozilla is requesting feedback from everyone, not just Facebook, which helps keep Facebook (and Mozilla) honest in this process. What alternative would you propose?
  - akersten 5y ago
    > What alternative would you propose? How about not working with the fox on the least invasive way to eat my fellow hens?
  - freebuju 5y ago
    Google's FLoC was proposed openly as this one is. Everyone and their grandma was up in arms about it. Why give Mozilla a free pass? What is so special about this proposal?
  - foxfluff 5y ago
    > As other commenters have pointed out, it makes sense to work with one of the two largest advertising firms when figuring out how to support their advertising needs, while maintaining user privacy. How about not figuring out how to support advertising needs? They can just stick to figuring out privacy. > What alternative would you propose? They could focus on user needs. Having an ad-blocker by default would be a good start. Figuring out how to remove advertisers and the incentive to advertise (and thus SEO spam etc.) from the internet is a goal I would support.
  - danShumway 5y ago
fikama 5y ago
> Before anybody jumps in and yells about how Mozilla is worse than Google, let me point out that Firefox is still objectively the best browser to use for privacy right now. So I will be that "anybody". On what do you base your opinion about firefox privacy? Because I reading across the web have got another impression, for example, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9374407 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9374407
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- danShumway 5y ago
  See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30306925 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30306925 Short version, deficiencies in Chromium and Safari as browser engines are large enough that they outweigh most telemetry concerns. Browsers like Brave can disable some telemetry, sure, but they can't add in the larger set of features that are missing from Chromium. Browser telemetry is worth thinking about and considering, but you should be less concerned about browser telemetry than you are about Ublock Origin performance.
jeffwask 5y ago
Mozilla ain't what it used to be.
ohgodplsno 5y ago
At this point, I cannot see any other explanation than the whole Mozilla Foundation C-suite being compromised and plants by Google. Assuming stupidity only goes so far. A single fuckup is incompetence, ten repeated fuckups is malice. If they wanted to sink Mozilla, they could not do any better.
- account42 5y ago
  Perhaps, but a simpler situation is that the C-suite is focusing on their own financials. But either way, it is clear that that Mozilla is no longer the free browser developer we need.
Yoric 5y ago
For what it's worth, I've been part of a Mozilla/Facebook partnership (on the Mozilla side) on data compression. Having two tech companies work together (especially when one of them is non-profit) often makes sense. For this case? I'm sure that there is a good reason. I'm not a Mozilla anymore, so I haven't followed that story, but I imagine that the rationale is something along the lines of "These days, stuff we do in the browser don't have much impact, as web standards have been superseded by Chrome. However, whenever we manage to convince a big company such as Facebook to do even one thing better, we can improve the lives of billions of people." PR impact might not be good, though.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

strulovich 5y ago

> I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard or that it would ever do anything other than try to weaken the standard. I don’t think that’s why you want FB/Meta here. But you want to make sure this is useful enough for the ad companies so this actually becomes a solution. If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just wasting time. Assuming the competition is standard built by Google within itself, this makes sense. (Meta employee, don’t work on ads, opinions my own)

MereInterest 5y ago
> If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just waiting time. Which is why regulation is needed. Otherwise, any solution needs to be more attractive to the advertisers than the people they stalk (i.e. everybody else).
- ahmed_ds 5y ago
  Is it me or these days major tech non profits feels marginally less of an advocate of privacy related matters compared EU as a whole? TBH I think GNU failed to make any sort of progress in terms of privacy because their ideology was always on the extremist side. And all the rest of the NGO's kept compromising to meet demands of big tech. Then you have the EU, who will just slap fines without compromising at all. Moreover lobbying runs US govt. Tech non profits are financed largely by megacorps so they won't necessarily bite the hand that feed them.
dessant 5y ago
We can just outlaw certain types of tracking, your employer does not need to be given a seat at the table, nor does it deserve one. Meta will happily use any data they can access about people, and this will just be an additional data point that augments the extensive behavioral profiles they have on most internet users. This is yet another attempt to not accept no for an answer when it comes to data collection, because not getting any data on users who refused data collection is unfathomable to them.
danShumway 5y ago
> But you want to make sure this is useful enough for the ad companies so this actually becomes a solution. I guess the question though is: is Facebook going to stop delivering ads if the solution isn't good enough? Why is it important that Facebook like the system? Facebook was very upset about Apple's privacy changes, it didn't get rid of ads on iOS. It's been very upset about a lot of things. What throws me in these conversations is that I'm not sure why the solution has to be one that Facebook is happy with. What Facebook would be happy with is as much data as they're allowed to have. And also, Facebook doesn't really have veto powers over what anyone else does, so it's not like we need to find a middle ground with the company. Part of the problem of building a solution that's good enough that advertisers won't want more is that it's difficult to believe that solution exists. Facebook is pretty clear that the constraints on what they'll collect is defined in their internal/public privacy policies, and within that constraint they will collect as much data as the platform offers. I'm not aware of any instances of a platform offering an ad attribution system that was privacy preserving, and having Facebook (or other companies) decide not to do any fingerprinting or insert any tracking links into pages, or use any cookies on that platform. I also find it really hard to believe that if Mozilla cracks down on fingerprinting and doesn't provide an alternative that Facebook is happy with, that Facebook will stop selling ads.
- lisper 5y ago
  My Bayesian prior is that anything that upsets FB is almost certainly a good thing, and vice versa.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    Indeed, the more upset they are the more likely it is that a solution really works.
    - Accacin 5y ago
      Exactly. Remember Facebook taking out a spread in a newspaper saying Apple would kill small businesses because they couldn't advertise? And that solution by Apple seemed to actually work in many respects. I'm really fed up with Mozilla. I've always used and believed in them but this just feels so odd.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
- dang 5y ago
  Would you please stop breaking the site guidelines, regardless of how strongly you feel about $topic? It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. We've already asked you repeatedly not to post flamewar comments on HN. Not cool. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- jefftk 5y ago
  > ad companies fuck off and die Does that include HN? Which is funded by an in-house advertising system with job ads that appear as sponsored posts?
seanhunter 5y ago
> If you build a super private solution no advertising company wants/can use, then you’re just wasting time. Not really. I don't want any advertising company to use any information about me under any circumstances. Working towards that goal is not wasting my time.
stingraycharles 5y ago
Your point of view is diplomatic, but it rests on the assumption that you actually need cooperation from adtech in order to make a solution. As Apple has proven, this is simply not true: you just need the entities that control the browser / OS. This implies that it’s not “collaboration with adtech” that you want, but rather “collaboration with the biggest browser vendors”. Unfortunately the biggest browser is in hands of Google. Thus Google has a huge influence in this. But any other adtech company (including FB/meta) has no meaningful contribution.
wintermutestwin 5y ago
>(Meta employee, don’t work on ads, opinions my own) FB = ads. It is their business imperative. Even if you are a campus janitor, you are "working on ads."

cglong 5y ago

FWIW, you can choose to "View final document" which gets rid of all the proposed vandalism. Still really bad that the default view contains all the proposals.

jer0me 5y ago

For anyone looking, I’m sure they’ll revert it soon: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KpdSKD8-Rn0bWPTu4UtK54ks0yv2j22pA5SrAD9av4s/edit https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KpdSKD8-Rn0bWPTu4UtK54ks...

danShumway 5y ago
I understand why people use Google Docs, it's a very convenient platform. But this is a technical document about browser features, I'm a little frustrated that this is being coordinated over a proprietary SaaS service instead of over Git[0] with markdown or something. I think a lot more than that, I'm frustrated that the document is being made publicly available on that platform. When someone links to a web standard on Github, often it's because the standard is seeing active participation. For something that is being linked to a public view, I would have loved to see at least a PDF export or something. It's not that it's completely inexcusable, I'm sure Mozilla is making use of Google Doc features, markups, contribution history, whatever. It is just disappointing to see that apparently there isn't an Open collaboration platform that Mozilla thinks is good enough for this process, even a self-hosted one. It's not the biggest deal in the world, it just feels like a bad look to see Mozilla tout that it's built this great standard, and then click on the link and get sent to a Google Doc. I mean... this article is about privacy, if I'm currently signed into Google and I click on this link, does it mean anything that Google now knows I personally clicked on it? I know it's not the end of the world, but Mozilla literally just finished telling me how good it was at anonymizing data, and now it's leaking my reading habits to Google in an extremely targeted, de-anonymized form. ---- [0]: Yes, I know that many standards processes on the web use Github, which is also a proprietary SaaS, but at least the majority of that process (issue tracker aside) is usable just as an endpoint.
- rascul 5y ago
  > It is just disappointing to see that apparently there isn't an Open collaboration platform that Mozilla thinks is good enough for this process, even a self-hosted one. Mozilla has been hosting an EtherPad instance for some time now, which may have worked in place of Google Docs for this. https://pad.mozilla.org https://pad.mozilla.org

sneak 5y ago

> I don't understand how I'm supposed to take Mozilla partnering with Facebook, I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard or that it would ever do anything other than try to weaken the standard. You should take it the exact same way as when: - Mozilla put proprietary, closed-source DRM (widevine) into their product - Mozilla put nonconsensual (opt-out) telemetry (aka spyware) into their product - Mozilla put Google backend services into their product - Mozilla put advertising/paid placement into their product The "Mozilla is about privacy and open standards" meme is a false one and has been for a long time. Actions speak a lot louder than words.

btdmaster 5y ago
This is correct for the most part, but please consider that Mozilla tried to stop DRM being standardised and only has it as an opt-in extension: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/drm-and-the-challenge-of-serving-users https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/drm-and-the-challenge-of...
danShumway 5y ago
Oh, come on. I did raise a stink over closed-source DRM, I raised a stink not just over Firefox adding it, I raised a stink over the entire web standards process. I have raised stinks about telemetry and advertising within Firefox. I've raised stinks about Pocket being purchased and not Open Sourced, and then integrated into the browser by default. I've raised stink about a lot of things. Nevertheless, it is still objectively true that Mozilla Firefox is the best mainstream browser right now for privacy, and anyone who argues otherwise is either not looking at the bigger picture or hasn't done much research into how companies do the majority of their tracking online. The privacy problems that Mozilla has had have objectively less impact on people's everyday privacy than Chromium's hobbled extension support. The ability to turn on anti-fingerprinting features uplifted from Tor is more important than whether or not Google search is enabled by default. Container-extensions are more practically impactful on everyday privacy than Pocket is. I am literally complaining about and criticizing Mozilla right now, and yet the immediate reaction is to jump on the one positive thing I said and act like I'm somehow ignoring Mozilla's other issues. I'm not ignoring those issues, but the "Mozilla is corrupt and no better than Google" meme is similarly completely ridiculous. Every single other browser on the market including DeGoogled Chromium and Safari are hobbled in ways that make them worse for privacy, and overall Mozilla still as a company has a better track record on fighting for privacy and building privacy-preserving tools than Google/Microsoft/Brave -- at least it has a better track record in the ways that matter. It is so frustrating to try and have a constructive conversation about real missteps that Mozilla is making when people view anything less than a complete condemnation of the company like that means they're being put on a pedestal. Mozilla isn't perfect, and it's clumsy and sometimes does outright bad stuff, and that is still consistent with them being one of the better corporate privacy advocates on the Internet.

BbzzbB 5y ago

>Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard I'm not saying "this is it", but here's a (IMO) reasonable line of thought why they would genuinely be working in that direction. Basically, short term pain for long term security. There is a clear preference by consumers for preserving privacy; the percentage of iOS users not allowing targeting since IDFA is proof. There is also political motivation for regulators to crack down on the wild west of online privacy in the US (FB scapegoating) and abroad (GDPR and co). If there is to be a hard turn by regulators and hardware/OS providers for privacy protection and FB does not prepare for it by preparing Audience Network to operate without granular personal data, their whole business model would be at risk and their terminal value threatened. Being prepared for a world placing privacy first protects their financial interests, likely even putting them ahead of competitors that are going in unprepared. If voting power at FB was majority owned by Wall Street shareholders, you could argue it's unlikely they would hurt operating income for years rather than milk it even if it's protective long term. But that's not the case, Mark does have a super majority and can afford governing for the long term even if it makes analysts critical.

thaumasiotes 5y ago

> I don't understand why I'm supposed to believe that Facebook would ever have beneficial insight to add to a privacy standard Well, the headline says "privacy preserving attribution for advertising". I'm guessing Facebook provides expertise in what kind of attribution advertisers want.

huhtenberg 5y ago

> Bigger story here It's not a bigger story. THE story - in fact, the REVELATION - here is that Mozilla thinks it's OK to cooperate with Facebook on PRIVACY work. You can't make this shit up. Not even on hard drugs.

bun_at_work 5y ago
As other commenters have pointed out, it makes sense to work with one of the two largest advertising firms when figuring out how to support their advertising needs, while maintaining user privacy. If Facebook doesn't use this method, the work towards private attribution that Mozilla is doing doesn't matter. Furthermore, Mozilla is requesting feedback from everyone, not just Facebook, which helps keep Facebook (and Mozilla) honest in this process. What alternative would you propose?
- akersten 5y ago
  > What alternative would you propose? How about not working with the fox on the least invasive way to eat my fellow hens?
- freebuju 5y ago
  Google's FLoC was proposed openly as this one is. Everyone and their grandma was up in arms about it. Why give Mozilla a free pass? What is so special about this proposal?
- foxfluff 5y ago
  > As other commenters have pointed out, it makes sense to work with one of the two largest advertising firms when figuring out how to support their advertising needs, while maintaining user privacy. How about not figuring out how to support advertising needs? They can just stick to figuring out privacy. > What alternative would you propose? They could focus on user needs. Having an ad-blocker by default would be a good start. Figuring out how to remove advertisers and the incentive to advertise (and thus SEO spam etc.) from the internet is a goal I would support.
- danShumway 5y ago

fikama 5y ago

> Before anybody jumps in and yells about how Mozilla is worse than Google, let me point out that Firefox is still objectively the best browser to use for privacy right now. So I will be that "anybody". On what do you base your opinion about firefox privacy? Because I reading across the web have got another impression, for example, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9374407 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9374407

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
danShumway 5y ago
See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30306925 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30306925 Short version, deficiencies in Chromium and Safari as browser engines are large enough that they outweigh most telemetry concerns. Browsers like Brave can disable some telemetry, sure, but they can't add in the larger set of features that are missing from Chromium. Browser telemetry is worth thinking about and considering, but you should be less concerned about browser telemetry than you are about Ublock Origin performance.

jeffwask 5y ago

Mozilla ain't what it used to be.

ohgodplsno 5y ago

At this point, I cannot see any other explanation than the whole Mozilla Foundation C-suite being compromised and plants by Google. Assuming stupidity only goes so far. A single fuckup is incompetence, ten repeated fuckups is malice. If they wanted to sink Mozilla, they could not do any better.

account42 5y ago
Perhaps, but a simpler situation is that the C-suite is focusing on their own financials. But either way, it is clear that that Mozilla is no longer the free browser developer we need.

Yoric 5y ago

For what it's worth, I've been part of a Mozilla/Facebook partnership (on the Mozilla side) on data compression. Having two tech companies work together (especially when one of them is non-profit) often makes sense. For this case? I'm sure that there is a good reason. I'm not a Mozilla anymore, so I haven't followed that story, but I imagine that the rationale is something along the lines of "These days, stuff we do in the browser don't have much impact, as web standards have been superseded by Chrome. However, whenever we manage to convince a big company such as Facebook to do even one thing better, we can improve the lives of billions of people." PR impact might not be good, though.

deleted 5y ago

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