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tl;dr: We built this site on a really tight time constraint, and had to use Blue State Digital to process emails and store personal data, hence the tracking cod
by sinak 13y ago
tl;dr: We built this site on a really tight time constraint, and had to use Blue State Digital to process emails and store personal data, hence the tracking codes.
I helped build stopwatching.us as part of the coalition of organizations and individuals in support, and thought I'd give a quick bit of insight into why the tracking stuff is in there.
When we came up with the idea for the site last Friday, we quickly realized that one of the trickiest parts to manage would be the privacy policies of the different organizations involved. There's over 80 different partners, and about 6 different core organizations involved. Mozilla and EFF in particular have really stringent legal conditions and privacy policies for any sites they promote, and we needed to make sure we abided by them.
On Mozilla's end we needed to have some way of collecting and storing emails and personal information that would get through their legal department quickly. Since they've used Blue State Digital in the past and screened both their technology and privacy policy, that was deemed the fastest way to make things work.
BSD includes things like the email tracking code automatically, and as far as I know there's not an easy way to strip that stuff out. Hence the tracking stuff in the emails.
- jmilkbal 13y agoThank you. Mozilla is a force for good. Mozilla have done nothing to show they are not worthy of our trust and you demonstrate that we have no reason to question it still.
- emilis_info 13y agoI am very glad that Mozilla takes privacy so seriously. I am glad it was a conscious decision. Also: I noticed the tracking codes in the email using Mozilla Thunderbird. By the way: the email I got was probably sent to Mozilla supporters, not to StopWatching.us signatories (although it seems they use the same From address). However, in the light of this privacy crisis, I think Mozilla should take time and think some more of what could be done. It doesn't look good anymore that the fastest solution was to choose a technology provider that uses recipient tracking. It is bad that BSD privacy policies probably don't stand a chance against a government request with a gag order. I can only hope that the privacy policy treats US and non-US citizens alike. I can also hope that the screening checked that BSD systems don't store too much data about the recipients.