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Telemetry is not synonymous with tracking. You can implement telemetry while not tracking users. You can track users without telemetry. There is a lot of telem

Telemetry is not synonymous with tracking. You can implement telemetry while not tracking users. You can track users without telemetry. There is a lot of telemetry, but there doesn’t seem to be any tracking.

marginalia_nu 4y ago
I don't want my applications to dial home and tell Mozilla what I'm doing with them. Doesn't matter what you call it.
- altairprime 4y ago
  It does. “I don’t want telemetry” and “I don’t want tracking” are two overlapping sets of people. Whether or not you care about the distinction, others do.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    It doesn't. You're replying to marginalia_nu, who has just clarified their position after you made a point. You're not replying to all those hypothetical people who haven't made a peep.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
jeroenhd 4y ago
What's the difference here? There's a unique client ID included in the report, so that means statistics can be tracked at the individual level. In theory you can have telemetry without tracking but I'm pretty sure nobody does it anymore.
- altairprime 4y ago
  Telemetry analysis doesn’t care who you are, and makes no effort to find out, even if it’s plausible that one could find out of effort was taken to do so. Tracking analysis does care who you are, and makes every effort to find out, whether to sell marketing to you or to sell your data to others. It isn’t necessary to deanonymize telemetry to make use of it, and it’s quite costly to do so (both in PII storage duties to GDPR et al. and in enrichment terms), so tracking isn’t knowingly done by default by lots of telemetry implementers (for example, Homebrew). Note that telemetry implemented using Facebook clearly does end up with Facebook trying to track you in order to sell you ads and sell your data; implementation decisions are critically relevant when it comes to collecting telemetry, in order to not accidentally cause tracking.
freedude 4y ago
"Telemetry is not synonymous with tracking. You can implement telemetry while not tracking users. You can track users without telemetry." Yes, it is. If you have the ability to track, then tracking is done. It is the nature of risk management.

marginalia_nu 4y ago

I don't want my applications to dial home and tell Mozilla what I'm doing with them. Doesn't matter what you call it.

altairprime 4y ago
It does. “I don’t want telemetry” and “I don’t want tracking” are two overlapping sets of people. Whether or not you care about the distinction, others do.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  It doesn't. You're replying to marginalia_nu, who has just clarified their position after you made a point. You're not replying to all those hypothetical people who haven't made a peep.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

jeroenhd 4y ago

What's the difference here? There's a unique client ID included in the report, so that means statistics can be tracked at the individual level. In theory you can have telemetry without tracking but I'm pretty sure nobody does it anymore.

altairprime 4y ago
Telemetry analysis doesn’t care who you are, and makes no effort to find out, even if it’s plausible that one could find out of effort was taken to do so. Tracking analysis does care who you are, and makes every effort to find out, whether to sell marketing to you or to sell your data to others. It isn’t necessary to deanonymize telemetry to make use of it, and it’s quite costly to do so (both in PII storage duties to GDPR et al. and in enrichment terms), so tracking isn’t knowingly done by default by lots of telemetry implementers (for example, Homebrew). Note that telemetry implemented using Facebook clearly does end up with Facebook trying to track you in order to sell you ads and sell your data; implementation decisions are critically relevant when it comes to collecting telemetry, in order to not accidentally cause tracking.

freedude 4y ago

"Telemetry is not synonymous with tracking. You can implement telemetry while not tracking users. You can track users without telemetry." Yes, it is. If you have the ability to track, then tracking is done. It is the nature of risk management.