What’s the behavior before this option was added? Would websites track you or not?
They definitely didn’t just stop tracking you because this option exists.
… I don’t know of this is satire or not.
- There is now a feature labeled “Privacy-preserving ad measurement” near the bottom of your Firefox Privacy settings. I recommend turning it off, or switching to a more privacy-conscious browser such as Google Chrome.
The updates don’t sound like satire. Some of this is crazypantsrants
The fact that both me and you are questioning whether this is satire or not worries me greatly.
Absolute clown shoes
Definitely satire, the context from earlier:
- Firefox is worse than Chrome in their implementation of ad snitching, because Chrome enables it only after user consent.
How is that obviously satire?
The emphasis in
Firefox is worse than Chrome
is in the original. To me that clearly implies that they are of the opinion that in general Google & Chrome are worse on privacy than Mozilla & Firefox. The comment at the end is just tongue in cheek snark alluding to the fact that in this particular case google did better for privacy in Chrome than Mozilla in Firefox.
I mean, have you met people? They could be completely serious when posting that lol.
I mean, have you met people?
I mean… I try not to
Same same. Also for like the same reason.
In which version is this?
Claim was this happened in ff 128, released july 9. I am currently on 128, and I found it turned on for me.
Yes. Just checked, was turned on.
I am on flatpak 128 as well and it isn’t there
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I’m currently on 115.12.0esr and the feature is absent.
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I mean, it doesn’t look like it’s personally identifiable at all, just aggregate.
IMO, that’s splitting a hair.
For a browser that supposedly respects user privacy, the fact that this is opt-out rather than opt-in really leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I’m going to reconsider my monthly recurring donation to Mozilla, especially if they keep this up.
Adjust isn’t google adservices. The difference is staggering, actually, and way more than a hair’s split on identifying information not being included.
I can’t help but see it as the foot in the door.
I understand that Mozilla needs money, but I can’t make everyone who uses Firefox commit to donating money to keep them from having to do things like this to stay afloat. But them going down this path makes me not want to donate at all.
I hate to break it to you but you aren’t a significant source of income for Mozilla. You are the product not the customer.
I never said I was, just that I wanted to support the browser that respects my privacy, and this move is making me reconsider it.
As long as it’s open source someone will be able to find a way to turn it off, either by an addon or by patching and compiling the source code.
weirdly if you search “website advertising preferences” in the firefox setting search bar nothing comes up, you have to manually scroll to find it
For everyone trying to find the setting— On my android phone, there’s a setting called “data collection”. Mine were already all off, so idk who it affects
WTF… i thought this was just click bait but went to check on my phone as i am not at my PC right now
These are old options. I checked these off long ago.
It was on for me too, wtf…
I’m using Mull.
Mine was off, just checked.
I’m on 128 on my phone. I just checked and both of those are disabled for me.
Same
double same
Triple same.
Idk what 128 is on a phone, but my galaxy s21 had everything still off. Guess I’ll have to keep an eye on it
build number (version) of Firefox, which is the software in question.
“Galaxy S21” is the model name for a physical Samsung phone, which isn’t relevant to the topic.
Oh, heard that. I’m on 128 on my phone too and they were all disabled
Use Mull
Just checked mine and it’s all disabled
I’m using mull fork of Firefox which doesn’t even have these settings, the tracking features are completely removed from the browser.
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I mostly see telemetry requests getting blocked in my firewall. Is there anything else I’ve missed?
Is google corrupting Mozilla?
now
why are you doing this to me?!
well at least there are good forks for the browser out there. how long until they start going chrome route?
Feels like google realized that once normies realize how shiti they are, they will run for firefox which by then hopefully will be a properly gutted front end for an ad company.
No. This is a privacy-protecting option that gathers no additional information about you or your hardware.
The other link posted in reply is overblown fear-mongering from Mozilla’s single biggest hater because they bought an ad company.
a privacy-protecting option that gathers no additional information about you or your hardware.
What information are they gathering then?
A single number per ad campaign of how many times an ad view resulted in a visit or purchase.
Mozilla’s announcement about it explains it pretty well: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/privacy-preserving-attribution
Then why aren’t they putting it up front and shouting from the rooftops about the new “privacy protecting feature”?
librewolf ftw
I keep hearing Tor is the thing now.
Literally every browser has this option, and it gives users a choice. If you use an ad blocker, it has this option as well and has had it for several years now.
This is the first browset to implement something like that. I don’t know what you’re talking about and you don’t either apparently.
Safari refers to it as “Privacy-Preserving Ad Measurement”, and Chrome includes an option as part of its “Privacy Sandbox.” Please have the decency to do a basic google search before being an asshole :)
Chrome’s privacy sandbox is a very different protocol from Mozilla’s PPA protocol. I haven’t read about Safari’s variant so I don’t know if that’s a copy/paste of Chrome’s or it’s own protocol
The big difference between Privacy Sandbox (previously Topics API and before that FLoC) and PPA is that Google’s “solution” still tracks the user while Mozilla’s just tracks the ads and gives aggregate data to the advertiser
Not this option, but generally I agree. Currently I don’t think this is bad, and in the longer term we will see if this leaks any identifyable data.
There are people that use Firefox who also get served ads?
Here’s the page about it:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/privacy-preserving-attribution?as=u&utm_source=inproduct
Read that instead of someones rant about it, which imo seems a bit obtuse.
This sounds fine, I’ve no problem emitting telemetry as long as it is 100% anonymous and can’t be traced to individuals
Well I do have a problem with that. Since we don’t see eye to eye, dont you agree then that it should have been opt in instead of a hidden opt out?
Let’s be honest, opt in telemetry features will collect so little data they might es well not exist.
Considering that ot is supposed to reduce user tracking by tracking ads directly, it’s a net gain for everyone.
I do agree with that :)
Same, although I have lingering paranoia that any data recorded by this might be traced back to me by making inferences when combined with other data; however, unlike the OOP, I will say I don’t really know what I’m talking about.
Did you ironically preserve the utm_source parameter?
No lol, I just didn’t notice and also didn’t expect it to be there. :|
- Main def of open source Ladybird browser not liking homosexuals or whatever:
Community: Boo!
- Mozilla acquiring an ad tech company and implementing it now:
Community: well, whatever.
I sense some mental dissonance.
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if by “community” you mean the majority of users… I think you are backwards in both of those. Most don’t care about what Andreas did, and most firefox users are outraged at this.
Cognitive dissonance? Not supporting bigotry is wholly unrelated to this issue. Also who calls gay people homosexuals? Just say gays like a normal person ffs
I would call it a vocal minority
Here’s the information about it. It’s anonymous and It can be turned off https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/privacy-preserving-attribution?as=u&utm_source=inproduct
As someone who works on data anonymization, I never trust anonymization.
That somehow males it better?
Yes. The problem with cookies was that they could be used to track and identify you. If this can’t do that, then what’s the issue?
The issue is that I already knew about cookies. I don’t want my browser to phone home (or anywhere else) without my consent.
Most data can be de-anonymized with some clever tricks. I don’t know about Mozilla but the other’s definitely try to keep it just anonymous engough to later be correlated with the rest of your profile.
Also, it might be annonymized for this dataset, by adding more ‘annonymized’ datasets stuff can be correlated
The problem is supporting ad networks.
Mozilla has to generate enough revenue to continue developing their products somehow. It would be nice if donations were enough to cover those development costs but that simply isn’t the case. Because of this the ad networks are a necessary “evil”.
Supporting ad networks is not a ‘necessary’ evil. There are many not-for-profit organisations that do not use ads for revenue raising.
What would you suggest then? They’ve been unable to sustain themselves via donations alone.
When writing my previous post I had started writing a list of suggested strategies; but I changed my mind about posting that. I’m not a member of Mozilla. I don’t know what particular challenges they face, and my expertise are not in not-for-profit fundraising. So although I do have ideas, I don’t really want to get into a trap of trying to defend my half-arse ideas against people picking them apart. It’s beside the point. The point is just that it is achievable, as evidenced by other organisations achieving it.
I will say though that they could at least just mention on the Firefox ‘successful update’ page that Firefox is supported by donations, and give a link. A lot of people really like Firefox; and I think that if Firefox asked for donations, they would get more donations.
Fire their ceo that they’re paying 6 million a year
The setting from the original post is for sites in general, it’s not specifically about Mozilla sites. I’m not sure how having this option relates to their revenue, unless Google put it in their search contract with them?
Edit: Wait, I see people mentioning Mozilla acquired an ad company?
Yes. Yes, they did.
Jesus.
Anonymous data collection at scale is a myth.
Anonymous data collection on me when assembled will say that I’m a 40-49yo unmarried college-educated male working in one area in a certain industry and living in another area.
Only one person meets all those criteria, and it’s me.
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It needs to be opt-in to be acceptable. Opt-out is not acceptable.
