7 ms·

There are many valid counterpoints on why you shouldn't trust/use this, but the mere existence of it raises a very valid point and calls Mozilla's BS; why does

There are many valid counterpoints on why you shouldn't trust/use this, but the mere existence of it raises a very valid point and calls Mozilla's BS; why does this fork exist at all if Mozilla supposedly cares about your privacy, security and freedom?

sneak 3y ago
Mozilla ships Firefox with telemetry (aka spyware, given that it operates silently and automatically without consent) enabled by default. They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. Mozilla doesn't actually care that much about privacy or freedom, it's just marketing to make line go up and to the right while Mozilla staff can keep collecting paychecks for being "the good guys". There's a lot of money involved. There is a big disconnect between what they say and what they do. They're not an ad company, so Google/Chrome is obviously worse, but if you care about privacy you don't ship a browser with surveillance features in it (which is what Firefox is). I am happy this project exists, and I will support them. This is how free software is supposed to work.
- mangecoeur 3y ago
  Telemetry and spyware are not the same thing (irrespective of whatever Firefox is doing). There is a big difference between tracking to try to understand how users are using a software or getting information on bugs and crashes, and tracking with the aim of monetizing personal data. I'm personally not crazy about telemetry implying information is uploaded to a software provider, but from experience I know that trying to create a software without getting in-use data is basically flying blind. You cannot expect users to tell you about problems or bugs they have, they will just stop using your software and you will never know why.
  - gabereiser 3y ago
    Tracking is tracking, no matter what outcomes you derive from it.
    - westpfelia 3y ago
      So your general thesis is that software that tracks errors and problems the software might have, and software that deliberately slows down the machine to make you buy new hardware A LA Apple is 100% the same thing?
      - gabereiser 3y ago
        I’m saying anything that tracks a user is not good for mankind. Telemetry is increasingly used for nefarious purposes. I have no problem if you want to track your own apps, but you can leave me out of it. You can derive my behavior from my access, my id, and my requests. You do not need to track my clicks, my history, my search phrases, my shopping habits, my location (unless I grant it to you), my cookies… You may not force feed me cookies.
      - sneak 3y ago
        The Apple throttling thing was specifically to extend the life of the device. When a battery is old, if the CPU is not throttled, the device will instantly power off when the draw is too high. Apple was throttling the CPU when the battery was old and could not sustain such power draw peaks in an effort to make the device remain usable for a longer period with a mostly-consumed battery pack. Had they not done so, the device would be unusable sooner. To assert that it is to make you buy new hardware is a factual error.
        gsich 3y ago
        Propaganda. Even if, a user toggle would have worked wonders.
        kaba0 3y ago
        Which is what ended up being implemented. That was a PR disaster on apple's part, but their motivation was genuinely good. They could have just let the phones power off randomly, like they were 5-6 years old -- android wouldn't even know about them anymore.
  - Firmwarrior 3y ago
    Firefox doesn't get to wear the white hat if they're doing a bunch of shady stuff and saying it's for my own good. By your logic, realistically, Google invading my privacy isn't a particularly big deal since they know the value of the data they're harvesting and will guard it. And third party data brokers are actually just making my web experience more tailored and relevant, so I should let them have their way with me too. Everyone has a good reason to cram something into my business.
    - NegativeK 3y ago
      There's an obvious difference between diagnostic data and data that's used to push ads to me. People might still object to diagnostic data and Firefox's handling of it, but it's disingenuous to state that they're the same.
      - Firmwarrior 3y ago
        What is that obvious difference? It isn't obvious to me. They're both companies spying on people to improve their own products, ostensibly to the customers' benefit.
    - kaba0 3y ago
      Ridiculous comment
      - Firmwarrior 3y ago
        Everything I said is 100% true. There are a lot of people on this very site working in adtech who don't feel like they're doing anything wrong at all and use the exact same logic that people use to justify "telemetry". In their mind, they're making a better product and a wealthier, more productive world in the process. You have literally no logical or moral delimiter between how Firefox spies on me to improve Firefox and how Windows does it or how ad companies do it. I'm sure you'll move the goalpost now and strain yourself to come up with something ex post facto, let's hear it.
        3y ago
  - sneak 3y ago
    > There is a big difference between tracking to try to understand how users are using a software or getting information on bugs and crashes, and tracking with the aim of monetizing personal data. I don't see the difference. In one case you are trying to improve your product using stolen data (which presumably results in your user sat scores and/or userbase going up and you continuing to receive a paycheck, ie monetization), and in the other case you are just selling the stolen data directly. In both cases you are taking private data without consent and using it to get money, or money-equivalent things (like a better product or more users). Technically and philosophically there is absolutely no distinguishing feature between opt-out "telemetry" and spyware. Both are using private user activity information, exfiltrated silently and without affirmative consent.
    - maccard 3y ago
      Like the argument with copyright, it's not theft. It's only theft if the user is deprived of something. > In both cases you are taking private data without consent and using it to get money, or money-equivalent things (like a better product or more users) This is just word salad. Opting in is consent. You are absolutely free to opt out, by following the clear instructions on the website [0], and you can continue to use the software. Your rights are being deprived here. Secondly, "money equivalent things" is a reductionist argument. Not everything fits neatly into a black and white "right" and "wrong" bucket, and arguing it does is forgetting about the fact that technology doesn't exist in a vacuum any more than any other product or industry. > Technically and philosophically there is absolutely no distinguishing feature between opt-out "telemetry" and spyware. Technically there's no difference between me sending any kind of data to a remote service. Using rote logic to infer behaviour is a fallacy, and when I read comments like this I end up (unfortunately) coming away thinking "this person has no critical thinking skills". I'm aware it's an ad-hominem, but logically there's no other explanation other than you can't possibly understand anything other than your narrow world view. [0] https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/telemetry-clientid https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/telemetry-clientid
    - taway1237 3y ago
      Spyware exists primarily to steal data, firefox also has "some" other uses. Calling firefox "spyware" dilutes the meaning by implying it's somehow similar to actual spyware.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > Telemetry and spyware are not the same thing Telemetry is spyware if it's done without the active informed consent of the user. What the collected data is actually used for isn't relevant. Consent is the relevant factor.
    - kaba0 3y ago
      I'm sure it is written in some license agreement you implicitly accept by downloading/installing the software.
      - sneak 3y ago
        That's not true. Firefox is free software. It is licensed under the MPL.
- maccard 3y ago
  > Mozilla ships Firefox with telemetry (aka spyware, given that it operates silently and automatically without consent) enabled by default. So opt out of it. Calling it spyware is inflammatory, and disregards the reality of the world that we exist in. > It's just marketing to make line go up and to the right while Mozilla staff can keep collecting paychecks for being "the good guys". There's a lot of money involved. And makes you sound like a conspiricy theorist. > They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. If FF didn't have media support I would switch to chrome, immediately. This is speaking as someone who has dogmatically used Firefox for 15 years. Software, such as web browsers don't exist in a perfect world that I wish it did. Instead, we have DRM, we have telemetry. A userbase requires marketing, which requires money. I wish it didn't, but it does.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Firmwarrior 3y ago
    It's hidden. It's spying. It's software. It's spyware.
    - dralley 3y ago
      It is neither hidden nor spying. The options are prominent in the settings, and both the source code and the policies around what is collection and explanations of how it is used are public. Moreover there is literally a page ("about:telemetry") where you can see exactly what data is being collected and links to all of the aforementioned resources and more. And the data itself (aggregated) is available for viewing at telemetry.mozilla.org. And they blog about all of this, from how the data is used to how you can see it for yourself to what efforts they make to ensure privacy while doing so. To call it "hidden" is either deliberately ignorant or a lie, I'm not sure which. https://blog.mozilla.org/data/tag/telemetry/ https://blog.mozilla.org/data/tag/telemetry/ https://wiki.mozilla.org/Data_Collection https://wiki.mozilla.org/Data_Collection https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/faq/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/faq/
    - taway1237 3y ago
- rascul 3y ago
  > They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. I thought it wasn't shipped with the browser but the browser asks if you want to download it when you first need it.
  - tech234a 3y ago
    EME-free builds are available if you know where to look: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/117.0/ https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/117.0/
- kaba0 3y ago
  Honestly, it is a pretty disgusting stance is all I can say. It is fine to not agree with every default config Firefox ships with, and feel free to change it for yourself (and distribute that), sure. But calling it out like that is just scummy, as they don't do anything malicious. All of these are just basic business practices done by most software you have on your computer.
Liquix 3y ago
The lion's share of Mozilla's funding comes directly from Google [0]. The official reason is to feature G search as the default in Firefox, but it also conveniently keeps alive the only browser preventing antitrust action against chromium. They may want to care about freedom - or have cared at some point in the past - but at the end of the day they're beholden to Google in order to survive [0] https://www.pcmag.com/news/mozilla-signs-lucrative-3-year-google-search-deal-for-firefox https://www.pcmag.com/news/mozilla-signs-lucrative-3-year-go...
- gorjusborg 3y ago
  > They may want to care about freedom - or have cared at some point in the past - but at the end of the day they're beholden to Google in order to survive Which makes one wonder if the existence of a competitor is a good measure of whether a monopoly exists. If a company is funding its main competitor, is it really a competitor? Google has a stranglehold on the browser market.
dangus 3y ago
The mere existence of a fork doesn’t prove anything one way or another. I can fork Firefox right now and say “It’s Firefox but without the code that the aliens use to abduct people.” Mozilla gets a some heat from the tech community for their pretty reasonable business model. I’ve seen Firefox be accused of being just about as bad as Chrome when it comes to user privacy and product monetization. To me that has always felt like a “both sides are the same” argument. In other words, not all telemetry is created equal.
Phelinofist 3y ago
> There are many valid counterpoints on why you shouldn't trust/use this Such as?
- 542458 3y ago
  Binaries are unsigned, third party update service, Google safe browsing disabled unless you build from source, running unusual browser setups can actually make you more distinctive online, unencrypted DNS by default, speed of security patches is slower than base Firefox, etc.
  - kaba0 3y ago
    Also, the expertise of its author is quite questionable. Browsers are insanely complex beasts, I think Mozilla does know their thing and necessary configs much better.
PurpleRamen 3y ago
Mozilla has a pragmatic view on privacy. Your freedom has no worth, when you can't use the browser because it breaks sites all the time. Though, it's true that Mozilla has become kinda lazy in their quest for protecting the user. They could do significant better.
kaba0 3y ago
Because Mozilla has to ship a browser that actually works? My grandma won't be going into about:config to temporarily disable this and that to make that site work. Also, people want to watch Netflix as well. Also, I really don't get all that fuss about some basic "telemetry", that word became way too overloaded. But the least I can do is like, share some basic data with this open-source project I freely use for many hours each day, e.g. in case of a crash.

sneak 3y ago

Mozilla ships Firefox with telemetry (aka spyware, given that it operates silently and automatically without consent) enabled by default. They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. Mozilla doesn't actually care that much about privacy or freedom, it's just marketing to make line go up and to the right while Mozilla staff can keep collecting paychecks for being "the good guys". There's a lot of money involved. There is a big disconnect between what they say and what they do. They're not an ad company, so Google/Chrome is obviously worse, but if you care about privacy you don't ship a browser with surveillance features in it (which is what Firefox is). I am happy this project exists, and I will support them. This is how free software is supposed to work.

mangecoeur 3y ago
Telemetry and spyware are not the same thing (irrespective of whatever Firefox is doing). There is a big difference between tracking to try to understand how users are using a software or getting information on bugs and crashes, and tracking with the aim of monetizing personal data. I'm personally not crazy about telemetry implying information is uploaded to a software provider, but from experience I know that trying to create a software without getting in-use data is basically flying blind. You cannot expect users to tell you about problems or bugs they have, they will just stop using your software and you will never know why.
- gabereiser 3y ago
  Tracking is tracking, no matter what outcomes you derive from it.
  - westpfelia 3y ago
    So your general thesis is that software that tracks errors and problems the software might have, and software that deliberately slows down the machine to make you buy new hardware A LA Apple is 100% the same thing?
    - gabereiser 3y ago
      I’m saying anything that tracks a user is not good for mankind. Telemetry is increasingly used for nefarious purposes. I have no problem if you want to track your own apps, but you can leave me out of it. You can derive my behavior from my access, my id, and my requests. You do not need to track my clicks, my history, my search phrases, my shopping habits, my location (unless I grant it to you), my cookies… You may not force feed me cookies.
    - sneak 3y ago
      The Apple throttling thing was specifically to extend the life of the device. When a battery is old, if the CPU is not throttled, the device will instantly power off when the draw is too high. Apple was throttling the CPU when the battery was old and could not sustain such power draw peaks in an effort to make the device remain usable for a longer period with a mostly-consumed battery pack. Had they not done so, the device would be unusable sooner. To assert that it is to make you buy new hardware is a factual error.
      - gsich 3y ago
        Propaganda. Even if, a user toggle would have worked wonders.
        kaba0 3y ago
        Which is what ended up being implemented. That was a PR disaster on apple's part, but their motivation was genuinely good. They could have just let the phones power off randomly, like they were 5-6 years old -- android wouldn't even know about them anymore.
- Firmwarrior 3y ago
  Firefox doesn't get to wear the white hat if they're doing a bunch of shady stuff and saying it's for my own good. By your logic, realistically, Google invading my privacy isn't a particularly big deal since they know the value of the data they're harvesting and will guard it. And third party data brokers are actually just making my web experience more tailored and relevant, so I should let them have their way with me too. Everyone has a good reason to cram something into my business.
  - NegativeK 3y ago
    There's an obvious difference between diagnostic data and data that's used to push ads to me. People might still object to diagnostic data and Firefox's handling of it, but it's disingenuous to state that they're the same.
    - Firmwarrior 3y ago
      What is that obvious difference? It isn't obvious to me. They're both companies spying on people to improve their own products, ostensibly to the customers' benefit.
  - kaba0 3y ago
    Ridiculous comment
    - Firmwarrior 3y ago
      Everything I said is 100% true. There are a lot of people on this very site working in adtech who don't feel like they're doing anything wrong at all and use the exact same logic that people use to justify "telemetry". In their mind, they're making a better product and a wealthier, more productive world in the process. You have literally no logical or moral delimiter between how Firefox spies on me to improve Firefox and how Windows does it or how ad companies do it. I'm sure you'll move the goalpost now and strain yourself to come up with something ex post facto, let's hear it.
      - 3y ago
- sneak 3y ago
  > There is a big difference between tracking to try to understand how users are using a software or getting information on bugs and crashes, and tracking with the aim of monetizing personal data. I don't see the difference. In one case you are trying to improve your product using stolen data (which presumably results in your user sat scores and/or userbase going up and you continuing to receive a paycheck, ie monetization), and in the other case you are just selling the stolen data directly. In both cases you are taking private data without consent and using it to get money, or money-equivalent things (like a better product or more users). Technically and philosophically there is absolutely no distinguishing feature between opt-out "telemetry" and spyware. Both are using private user activity information, exfiltrated silently and without affirmative consent.
  - maccard 3y ago
    Like the argument with copyright, it's not theft. It's only theft if the user is deprived of something. > In both cases you are taking private data without consent and using it to get money, or money-equivalent things (like a better product or more users) This is just word salad. Opting in is consent. You are absolutely free to opt out, by following the clear instructions on the website [0], and you can continue to use the software. Your rights are being deprived here. Secondly, "money equivalent things" is a reductionist argument. Not everything fits neatly into a black and white "right" and "wrong" bucket, and arguing it does is forgetting about the fact that technology doesn't exist in a vacuum any more than any other product or industry. > Technically and philosophically there is absolutely no distinguishing feature between opt-out "telemetry" and spyware. Technically there's no difference between me sending any kind of data to a remote service. Using rote logic to infer behaviour is a fallacy, and when I read comments like this I end up (unfortunately) coming away thinking "this person has no critical thinking skills". I'm aware it's an ad-hominem, but logically there's no other explanation other than you can't possibly understand anything other than your narrow world view. [0] https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/telemetry-clientid https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/telemetry-clientid
  - taway1237 3y ago
    Spyware exists primarily to steal data, firefox also has "some" other uses. Calling firefox "spyware" dilutes the meaning by implying it's somehow similar to actual spyware.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > Telemetry and spyware are not the same thing Telemetry is spyware if it's done without the active informed consent of the user. What the collected data is actually used for isn't relevant. Consent is the relevant factor.
  - kaba0 3y ago
    I'm sure it is written in some license agreement you implicitly accept by downloading/installing the software.
    - sneak 3y ago
      That's not true. Firefox is free software. It is licensed under the MPL.
maccard 3y ago
> Mozilla ships Firefox with telemetry (aka spyware, given that it operates silently and automatically without consent) enabled by default. So opt out of it. Calling it spyware is inflammatory, and disregards the reality of the world that we exist in. > It's just marketing to make line go up and to the right while Mozilla staff can keep collecting paychecks for being "the good guys". There's a lot of money involved. And makes you sound like a conspiricy theorist. > They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. If FF didn't have media support I would switch to chrome, immediately. This is speaking as someone who has dogmatically used Firefox for 15 years. Software, such as web browsers don't exist in a perfect world that I wish it did. Instead, we have DRM, we have telemetry. A userbase requires marketing, which requires money. I wish it didn't, but it does.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Firmwarrior 3y ago
  It's hidden. It's spying. It's software. It's spyware.
  - dralley 3y ago
    It is neither hidden nor spying. The options are prominent in the settings, and both the source code and the policies around what is collection and explanations of how it is used are public. Moreover there is literally a page ("about:telemetry") where you can see exactly what data is being collected and links to all of the aforementioned resources and more. And the data itself (aggregated) is available for viewing at telemetry.mozilla.org. And they blog about all of this, from how the data is used to how you can see it for yourself to what efforts they make to ensure privacy while doing so. To call it "hidden" is either deliberately ignorant or a lie, I'm not sure which. https://blog.mozilla.org/data/tag/telemetry/ https://blog.mozilla.org/data/tag/telemetry/ https://wiki.mozilla.org/Data_Collection https://wiki.mozilla.org/Data_Collection https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/faq/ https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/faq/
  - taway1237 3y ago
rascul 3y ago
> They also ship closed source DRM in the browser which infringes on software freedoms. I thought it wasn't shipped with the browser but the browser asks if you want to download it when you first need it.
- tech234a 3y ago
  EME-free builds are available if you know where to look: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/117.0/ https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/117.0/
kaba0 3y ago
Honestly, it is a pretty disgusting stance is all I can say. It is fine to not agree with every default config Firefox ships with, and feel free to change it for yourself (and distribute that), sure. But calling it out like that is just scummy, as they don't do anything malicious. All of these are just basic business practices done by most software you have on your computer.

Liquix 3y ago

The lion's share of Mozilla's funding comes directly from Google [0]. The official reason is to feature G search as the default in Firefox, but it also conveniently keeps alive the only browser preventing antitrust action against chromium. They may want to care about freedom - or have cared at some point in the past - but at the end of the day they're beholden to Google in order to survive [0] https://www.pcmag.com/news/mozilla-signs-lucrative-3-year-google-search-deal-for-firefox https://www.pcmag.com/news/mozilla-signs-lucrative-3-year-go...

gorjusborg 3y ago
> They may want to care about freedom - or have cared at some point in the past - but at the end of the day they're beholden to Google in order to survive Which makes one wonder if the existence of a competitor is a good measure of whether a monopoly exists. If a company is funding its main competitor, is it really a competitor? Google has a stranglehold on the browser market.

dangus 3y ago

The mere existence of a fork doesn’t prove anything one way or another. I can fork Firefox right now and say “It’s Firefox but without the code that the aliens use to abduct people.” Mozilla gets a some heat from the tech community for their pretty reasonable business model. I’ve seen Firefox be accused of being just about as bad as Chrome when it comes to user privacy and product monetization. To me that has always felt like a “both sides are the same” argument. In other words, not all telemetry is created equal.

Phelinofist 3y ago

> There are many valid counterpoints on why you shouldn't trust/use this Such as?

542458 3y ago
Binaries are unsigned, third party update service, Google safe browsing disabled unless you build from source, running unusual browser setups can actually make you more distinctive online, unencrypted DNS by default, speed of security patches is slower than base Firefox, etc.
- kaba0 3y ago
  Also, the expertise of its author is quite questionable. Browsers are insanely complex beasts, I think Mozilla does know their thing and necessary configs much better.

PurpleRamen 3y ago

Mozilla has a pragmatic view on privacy. Your freedom has no worth, when you can't use the browser because it breaks sites all the time. Though, it's true that Mozilla has become kinda lazy in their quest for protecting the user. They could do significant better.

kaba0 3y ago

Because Mozilla has to ship a browser that actually works? My grandma won't be going into about:config to temporarily disable this and that to make that site work. Also, people want to watch Netflix as well. Also, I really don't get all that fuss about some basic "telemetry", that word became way too overloaded. But the least I can do is like, share some basic data with this open-source project I freely use for many hours each day, e.g. in case of a crash.