43 ms·
Firefox is becoming an AI browser and the internet is not at all happy about it
- jMyles 10mo agoYes, this seems to suck. But I've been wrong about plenty before. I'll keep an open mind.
- cranberryturkey 10mo agoMan is there anything left that isn't a total invasion of privacy??
- ranger_danger 10mo agoliving off-grid
- cranberryturkey 10mo agoYou got me there lol
- jqpabc123 10mo agoYes. Brave Helium LibreWolf
- MangoToupe 10mo ago> Brave Did brave's attempt to provide an alternative funding model to ads actually go anywhere?
- mplewis 10mo agoYeah, straight into the cryptocurrency trash heap.
- jqpabc123 10mo agoactually go anywhere? It hasn't gone away or sold out to Google.
- freehorse 10mo agoBrave's funding model always included ads [0], but these are supposed to "respect privacy" (ie not collecting personal data and targeting). Not sure how they are there right now. I know there was controversy in the past due to their "ads replacement" scheme where they were replacing ads in websites with their own ads, and my impression is that all this "brave rewards" thing did not go through much. Similar notion of "privacy respecting advertising" has also been stated in mozilla's texts about firefox several times, eg [1], and that goes a long time back in general [2]. I don't think that any of these attempts from brave or firefox have actually worked. In general, this is the business model (or part thereof) of many/most "privacy focused" services, ie serving ads while "respecting users' privacy". Duckduckgo does that for example. A few of them are even owned by advertising companies (eg startpage). Alternative models are subscriptions (eg kagi) and/or sponsorship/donations (eg ladybird?). [0] https://brave.com/about/#:~:text=Brave%20Ads,-Brave https://brave.com/about/#:~:text=Brave%20Ads,-Brave [1] https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-leadership-growth-planning-updates/#:~:text=investing%20in%20privacy%2Drespecting%20advertising https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-leadership-growt... [2] "we want to show the world that it is possible to do relevant advertising and content recommendations while still respecting users’ privacy and giving them control over their data" https://blog.mozilla.org/advancingcontent/2015/05/21/providing-a-valuable-platform-for-advertisers-content-publishers-and-users/ https://blog.mozilla.org/advancingcontent/2015/05/21/providi...
- MangoToupe 10mo ago> Similar notion of "privacy respecting advertising" has also been stated in mozilla's texts about firefox several times, eg [1], and that goes a long time back in general [2]. Yea; it seems pretty dead as an approach. The ads are the problem. We need alternative models to advertising. It's absolutely baffling how there simply hasn't been any real competition for thirty years.
- SirFatty 10mo agoTor
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoI've actually been using Tor more and more as secondary to Firefox. Hey, I wonder if "exactly like Tor minus connecting to the Tor network" exists. No, don't tell me this is just Firefox, that's not true.
- guizadillas 10mo agoIt's Librewolf
- godelski 10mo agoI think you're looking for the Mullvad Browser[0]. They work directly with Tor and are doing exactly what you're asking for. And no, you do not need to use Mullvad VPN [0] https://mullvad.net/en/browser https://mullvad.net/en/browser
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoYes! I wrote to the Tor Project and that's exactly what they replied! Installed already. Thank you.
- frm88 10mo agoI cannot currently test the Mullvad browser, can you tell us whether it supports Ublock Origin or another competent ad-blocker (is there even another?). Because, frankly the ad-blocker is a make-or-break for me.
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoIt does! So far I can see the following: - uBlock Origin included - mullvad extension to force DNS (disabled if you don't grant it permissions) - button for "new identity" that clears all cookies and restarts - NoScript included, but some JS permitted. - Fewer customization options than firefox to resist fingerprinting - Bucketed/discretized screen size to resist fingerprinting EDIT: hard facts: https://mullvad.net/en/browser/hard-facts https://mullvad.net/en/browser/hard-facts
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo ago> Brave I'm not interested in crypto right now, thanks for asking.
- jqpabc123 10mo agoNeither am I --- but this doesn't impede anyone from using their browser.
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoIt does indirectly. I don't have the technical skills or interest in examining if a browser is working for me or working for someone else, and therefore I have to trust the people developing the browser. I don't trust people who associate themselves with crypto, therefore I don't trust the software they write.
- jqpabc123 10mo agoI don't trust people who associate themselves with crypto But you trust people who associate themselves with and are being directly paid by the biggest privacy invader on the planet?
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoSorry, who is that? Google? No, I don't, what makes you think that?
- bigstrat2003 10mo agoBrave has never once shoved crypto in my face so I don't think your implication is reasonable.
- thesuitonym 10mo agoOf course not, don't be silly. Why would they shove it in your face when they could just quietly mine it in the background?
- cranberryturkey 10mo agoBrave??? lol wtf I use librewolf
- godelski 10mo ago> Brave Chromium > Helium Chromium > LibreWolf WaterFox MullvadBrowser
- stalfosknight 10mo agoSafari
- Der_Einzige 10mo agoThis is what you get for not caring about projects like thorium or the Firefox version of it. I’ve still got my ublock origin in a far faster version of my web browser than what normies use.
- ranger_danger 10mo agoSpeedrunning to the grave it seems.
- zb3 10mo agoIt's the governments' fail.. this kind of software can't be profitable, so it should be funded via grants for common good.. these did not arrive though.
- MangoToupe 10mo agoSeriously. All things considered, browsers are extremely cheap to fund. The fact that no government has come forward to spearhead this movement is damning to the concept of the state. And no, I obviously don't want to fund Mozilla, a hilariously incompetent entity that hates its users.
- apercu 10mo agoThe U.S. isn’t anti-socialism, it’s anti-public benefit. We’ll socialize losses for banks to pay bonuses, but funding shared infrastructure that serves citizens is a bridge too far.
- cogman10 10mo ago> is damning to the concept of the state. Not really. It's a web browser and from a non-tech politician they already have the internet. It's pretty hard to get a government to understand why the 1000 webkit browsers aren't actually competitive. They'd rather send money and regulations towards something they can better understand like healthcare or right to repair. Heck, even "AI".
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago> from a non-tech politician I could count on one hand the jurisdictions in which a publicly-funded browser wouldn’t eventually cause a voter backlash. Unless it—and the rest of the government—are run perfectly, paying for something most people get for free sounds like corruption.
- cogman10 10mo agoI don't think you could do it as a direct "fund browsers" law. You'd have to do it as a "technology research fund". Something we already somewhat have in the US with the National Laboratories. But those budgets are pretty limited. The NSA gets a whole lot more money to pay for it's research.
- harrygeez 10mo agoLadybird can't arrive sooner
- guizadillas 10mo agoladybird can take all the time they need, servo is the one I'm waiting for
- redkoala 10mo agoServo is pretty well run, and their regular donations have been improving. Details below if you want to also help https://servo.org/blog/2025/12/15/november-in-servo/#donations https://servo.org/blog/2025/12/15/november-in-servo/#donatio...
- grimblee 10mo agoSame, ladybird's devs have expressed far-right opinions, can't trust them with my data
- mghackerlady 10mo agomade this exact comment earlier lol
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoSo guys. What do I replace firefox with? I'm on Debian, and my requirements is that I'm able to run uBlock Origin. In addition containers and vertical tabs would be nice to have. What are the options here?
- philipwhiuk 10mo agoWaterfox.
- boplicity 10mo agoWhy replace Firefox? The headline and linked article don't seem to match reality at all. It's just a bunch of clickbait nonsense.
- ekjhgkejhgk 10mo agoThis person also said in an interview that he'd consider blocking uBlock Origin from Firefox. Evidence is piling up against this person.
- mod50ack 10mo agoWhere did he say that?
- 1shooner 10mo agoDo you have a link? I can't find any reference to this. The only hits I'm getting are a Mozilla leadership AMA where they are reiterating their support for ad blockers.
- judah 10mo agoNot exactly. Here's the quote[0]: > "He says he could begin to block ad blockers in Firefox and estimates that’d bring in another $150 million, but he doesn’t want to do that. It feels off-mission." The article doesn't give an exact quote from Enzor-DeMeo. [0]: https://www.theverge.com/tech/845216/mozilla-ceo-anthony-enzor-demeo https://www.theverge.com/tech/845216/mozilla-ceo-anthony-enz...
- roldie 10mo agoAm I happy about it? No. But I don't understand the huge backlash in all the comments yesterday. It felt like everyone overreacted. For me, Firefox still checks off the most boxes of what I want in a browser.
- ceejayoz 10mo agoTo me it's a bit like when your favorite fancy restaurant stops making its own bread in-house. The change itself isn't huge, and isn't all that surprising… but it's not a great sign for how the place will look in a decade.
- zdragnar 10mo agoIt's more like your favorite fancy restaurant has a few dishes that suck. Instead of putting time into improving table service, fixing up the menu, maybe getting some aspects of service up to standards, they decided that every meal now comes with a back massage. That's not their core competency. Firefox is good, but it could be great. Adding AI features aren't what will move the needle on their core competency.
- jfindper 10mo ago>But I don't understand the huge backlash in all the comments yesterday. Well, it was an excuse to get the pitchforks out! We love to do that around here. Especially if I can say "AI", "slop", "crypto", "MBA", etc.
- ConceptJunkie 10mo agoI've come to the conclusion that anyone who uses the term "AI slop" probably doesn't have anything meaningful to say. Not that "AI slop" isn't a thing, but its use is just a buzzword that doesn't mean anything and is becoming less and less relevant as the tools improve.
- altairprime 10mo agoThis is exactly how some others treat anyone who says AI. It’s not as though somehow GANNs are suddenly deserving of being labeled ‘intelligent’ at precisely the time when corporations are betting the farm on their hopes and dreams of replacing biological intelligence. It’s just a marketing buzzword that sells a framing of worker deprecation, something businesses have been fantasizing about since the Industrial Revolution, right? And so anyone who’s using the term must have a dismissible opinion that need not be given serious consideration. (This isn’t how I approach the topic, but one hopes that such unfounded dismissals are not widespread, eh?)
- PaulKeeble 10mo agoIf I can turn it off as they claim I don't care too much other than it's development time wasted towards something I won't be using. They could have spent time fixing some of the sites that don't work correctly, implementing standards that are missing or just improving performance and memory usage. All of those things would be welcome as would some improvements on the mobile version it's not super usable I find it kind of irritating.
- godelski 10mo ago> If I can turn it off as they claim Why wouldn't you be able to turn it off? You can already do so with the current AI stuff and it is an open source browser so they couldn't stop you if they wanted to.
- simulator5g 10mo agoThey’ll let you turn it off until people don’t care as much, then it will quietly become mandatory. Only some of the nerds will even care, since by then the panopticon will probably be fully constructed.
- godelski 10mo agoI repeat >> it is an open source browser so they couldn't stop you if they wanted to. And there are already forks doing just this
- PaulKeeble 10mo agoYou can turn the existing AI off if you learn the magic incantation for about:config, its not very usable. I would hope they will provide some proper switches in the settings menu for each of the AI features they intend, including the one for automatic tab grouping (which so far is total garbage and a complete waste of CPU).
- estimator7292 10mo agoThe setting exists, but may or may not actually be respected based on user reports. Just like their auto-updates, you can turn the option off, but whether the feature is actually disabled is another question entirely. I don't trust Mozilla enough. For one, not giving UI options and hiding all the settings in about:config where non-technical users can't access is a shitty thing to do. Second, I have zero trust that the settings actually do anything since many don't. I don't believe for one moment that turning off their AI features actually 100% prevents that code from running.
- Zaskoda 10mo agoI have been not happy about it up until this post. While reading the article, I thought about it differently. What Firefox provides today isn't drawing in new users. Those of us who use Firefox do so for a number of reasons related to privacy or security or what not. I simultaneously like being able to use ChatGPT to look stuff up and I hate that I'm feeding the machine a profile of me. I don't use ChatGPT nearly as much anymore mostly because of that sick feeling I get in my stomach knowing whatever I tell it will absolutely be abused in some way some how. Nobody is building a very good "thing" that lets you use AI services with a solid layer of protection. That is a new market that deserves a product. I'm not saying that I think putting AI in Firefox is a good idea. Just that I can finally see the motivation. Personally, I think the "solution" should be some kind of stand alone product that maybe has integrations into Firefox if you have both of them installed. Keep it in it's own cage. Make the only possibility of it existing on my system be me choosing to install a specific app. And if I'm going to do that, let me also use it outside of Firefox if I want. But at least now I see a reason for what seems like such a bone headed decision.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- nativeit 10mo agoI’ve never understood why Firefox doesn’t just make an extension with first-party support, instead of bloating their browser with gimmicks that a large cohort of users don’t want, and that probably shouldn’t be included by default at this point anyway. Or, shit, they came up with “Focus” for a “privacy browser”, do that and leave Firefox alone. Better yet, implement any of the litany of fixes and features your users actually requested.
- saltcured 10mo agoThis gets off topic of Firefox, but I don't see how any middleware can address your concern. It is the very information you feed to the AI to get results that is in danger. No matter how you mask some metadata or account info, the actual in-band content is a problem. The only solution is self-hosting of a model so the input and output cannot be monitored. And this also means running it offline, since a "black box" model that can do RAG or MCP or anything like that could also use covert channels to leak the information you are trying to control.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- devsda 10mo agoWhat does it take to make a rebranded fork of Firefox popular similar to Brave or Edge? Ideally the fork should compete with Chrome and not Firefox for market share while acting as a hedge/warning against bad decisions from Mozilla and its leadership.
- guitcastro 10mo agoTo be honest, I think librewolf will gain traction with firefox continue their journey to enshitification.
- echelon_musk 10mo agoSadly the name is junk so I doubt it will ever take off outside of technical circles, which will ensure its irrelevance. I think Brave did a decent job of naming their browser.
- ivanmontillam 10mo agoyeah, it reeks of LibreOffice, which is not mentally associated with a high-quality office suite.
- thesuitonym 10mo agoI don't know that the name had much to do with it. Brave was successful because of an ultra-high-powered marketing campaign.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- alfiedotwtf 10mo agoNo shit
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- TheJoeMan 10mo agoAre there any suggestions for a minimal browser to use to interface with embedded / IoT? The firefox devs assume it is only used to access The Internet. For example, SSL scare-screens when connecting to a local 10.0.x.x address, or it trying to autofill a password for 192.168.1.1 which is nonsensical as the end devices are different in different (physical) locations. Don’t get me started on Apple devices auto-disconnecting from ad-hoc wifi networks without internet access.
- treis 10mo agoThis is like people railing against images in their webpages or that run their browsers without JavaScript. Like that LLMs are a fundamental paradigm shift in how we interact with computers and the web. How it all plays out is up for debate but there's no doubt that 10 years from now LLMs will play a role in nearly every interaction we have with a computer. The only way that's not true is if something better comes along. Pining for pre-AI world is like wanting families to gather around the radio. Those days are gone.
- conartist6 10mo agoI can doubt that!!!!
- hkhumiteme 10mo ago[dead]
- Xerox9213 10mo agoI think a lot of families actually restrict or eliminate screen time altogether, and gather round using either no technology, old technology, or new technology that imitates old technology, e.g. Yoto. There is value found in reducing our technology use. Some people may want to avoid AI on ethical grounds, or may be cautious about the cognitive effects of its use.
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago> there's no doubt that 10 years from now LLMs will play a role in nearly every interaction we have with a computer I tend to agree with you. Doesn’t make what Mozilla is doing sensible. In 1995, one could correctly observe that the internet would “play a role in nearly every interaction we have with a computer.” It would not follow that every app must reïnvent the network stack. An AI helping out can be useful. Every app being a tiny AI is a cacophony of idiots.
- treis 10mo agoIf they were training their own foundational model your analogy would be on the mark. But this is more like porting a command line application to a GUI.
- shadowgovt 10mo agoUnfortunately, the Internet doesn't really pay the bills, and that's the issue.
- willvarfar 10mo agoI desperately want the kind of success we used to have searching on google back over a decade ago. Relevant results. A few annoying ads started appearing with paid placement, but we all ignored them. Nowadays google search results are so cluttered with paid promotion that the genuine content creating websites and blogs are drowned. So we turn to AI not because it's better than the old straightforward search, but because it is better and currently less ad-laden than the current search?
- thesuitonym 10mo agoAds are coming to AI, too. At the risk of sounding like a shill, Kagi offers a better search experience than even Google back in the day.
- EA-3167 10mo agoPart of the issue is the search tech itself, but part of the issue is how the web has been warped by SEO. Search and what was being discovered weren’t always in such an adversarial relationship. For me though the closest I can get to the good old days is Kagi. Not a sponsor.
- willvarfar 10mo agoIt's also that Google brought Doubleclick and that completely flipped their incentives. Now they get money sending you to the content farms and what is good for their business isn't necessarily aligned with what is good for you...?
- BizarroLand 10mo agoAnd because of Googles search system, almost every result comes from a content farm or some other page that has "optimized for google search" i.e., filled their pages with so much pointless dreck that finding the information you came for becomes nearly impossible. LLMs that are trained off of that dreck give you the answer you were looking for (sometimes, when they don't make it up). And they've gotten to the point where they do so more quickly than trying to find it yourself in many cases, but I would much rather websites and search results being faithful stewards of the functions they are intended for and to get the information from the tap rather than having an AI butler deliver it to me.
- afavour 10mo agoI’m an AI skeptic. I think a lot of these pronouncements about how AI is going to revolutionize the workplace and/or society itself are made by snake oil salesmen who are looking out for their own profits. And yet. I think skepticism can go too far. One area I really do think AI is going to take over is web search. Primarily because web search these days is so shitty but that’s besides the point. AI is absolutely going to be a core feature used by the users of web browsers, and a web browser is the core of what Mozilla offers. They absolutely should be present in this space. And I hope, even though it’s an immense challenge, they might be able to offer an alternative to the aforementioned snake oil salesmen.
- nemomarx 10mo agoWhat's the use case of an ai chat built into the browser instead of just going to a web page that has it? I would think ai browser integration should be about automating it or something instead
- strict9 10mo ago>Primarily because web search these days is so shitty but that’s besides the point. Obviously there are a lot of reasons for this. But I think one of the most important reasons is that there is so few organic interesting content destinations anymore. Sure there are some neat shopify stores, news sites, and a few dedicated souls keeping up blogs. But so much of the casual browsing that the web once was has been obliterated by the move to social media. And what hasn't moved is now a mess of AI generated fluff or link farms. I used to think Google made search worse to increase ad revenue. And maybe it's tangentially related. But the stuff I used to search for and find and get inspiration from has moved to walled gardens. Reddit is one of the few remaining open web destinations left. AI can't solve that problem.
- danaris 10mo ago> there is so few organic interesting content destinations anymore. Are there really? Or are they out there, just impossible to find, because search is fully captured by ad-related interests, and they're not running ads? And if it were the latter, how would you even know if you weren't already aware of these little islands of organic discussion?
- ifh-hn 10mo agoAs long as I'm still in control, and it's actually useful, I don't see any issues with this direction, especially given the competition. In fact I regularly use the summarize page functionality in one of my profiles and find in very convenient. This seems like the usual Firefox criticism, where they get schtick for doing the same as all the others who don't.
- prophesi 10mo agoI would normally say I’m fine with it if I can turn it off, but making agentic browsing secure is currently an unsolved problem, so I’d have concerns with the risks this will pose for people unaware of the lethal trifecta.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- ChrisArchitect 10mo ago[dupe] Lots of discussions: Mozilla appoints new CEO Anthony Enzor-Demeo https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46288491 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46288491 Is Mozilla trying hard to kill itself? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46299934 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46299934 No AI* Here – A Response to Mozilla's Next Chapter https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46295268 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46295268
- godelski 10mo agoCan we just not be irrationally mad at Mozilla for once? It is beyond me that here, on HN, of all places people do not understand the criticality that FF is to the free and open internet. Use WaterFox or whatever, but stop picking a different color of Chrome. It doesn't take a genius to figure out Mozilla is trying everything they can to stay relevant. Literally everything they do ends up with tons of HN comments making complaints. Tons of complaints coming from people who haven't even used FF in a decade! It feels like a disinformation campaign but I'm pretty sure you all just like to hate on Mozilla and justify your usage of Chrome. We're just fucking ourselves over here. Yes, there's reasons to complain about FF. There's no shortage. But are they truly big enough reasons to hand over the keys to the internet to a singular entity? And to Google of all companies?! Who the fuck cares about this AI browser stuff, you can opt out or use a fork like WaterFox who makes that the default. Guess who's AI stuff you can't opt-out of? Is it really worth it? Is 3 clicks to uninstall AI seriously enough justification to give Google the internet? What are we even doing...
- mnls 10mo agoFirefox holds about 2.25% of the global browser market share. There is absolutely no "criticality" at all. Google won and also they are the ones who pay for your favorite browser to remain somewhat alive.
- godelski 10mo agoIt isn't over till its over[0]. > your favorite browser Why aren't you using it? Honest question. What does Chrome do that FF doesn't? [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBxMPqxJGqI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBxMPqxJGqI
- mnls 10mo agoI've stopped using it after the iRobot fiasco. I use Brave or Ungoogled Chromium. What do they do better? Pretty much everything.
- cornonthecobra 10mo agoAs long as I can deploy a pkg with the AI features completely disabled administratively, I'm fine with it. I'd like it a lot more if it was strictly opt-in, and they made non-AI LTS releases, but I understand that's at odds with eyeball acquisition
- josefritzishere 10mo agoYou can largely disable it in Firefox in about:config. I'd prefer a one clicn setting for ease of use. https://askubuntu.com/questions/1556081/how-to-disable-all-the-ai-features-in-firefox-to-increase-performance https://askubuntu.com/questions/1556081/how-to-disable-all-t...
- devinprater 10mo agoAI features you say? They could start by taking the alt-text generation model and making it browser-wide if blind people want it, not just for PDF's.
- frm88 10mo agoThis. Why do features like this always get swept under the rug? Accessibility could be a major feature Firefox gains revenue on. Make it paid, if absolutely necessary. Instead of hopping on the latest hype train.
- IAmGraydon 10mo agoWhat exactly is an “AI browser”?