There have been multiple accounts created with the sole purpose of posting advertisement posts or replies containing unsolicited advertising.

Accounts which solely post advertisements, or persistently post them may be terminated.

Blisterexe ,

This looks fine, the browser just puts your search into a category like “health” or “tech”, then sends the amount of each category completely anonymously.

Also, if you’ve opted out of data collection already that setting applies to this too.

mouse ,
@mouse@midwest.social avatar

I agree. I am someone who values their privacy and often does not like opt-out style analytics however I also know opt-in skews analytics. The way the searches are only categorized, and they are using Oblivious HTTP keeping IP addresses private makes me A-OK with this.

Blisterexe ,

This is the best take so far, I totally agree

not_a_king ,

i know they’re a company and they need to float, but this should be opt in not opt out

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

Yes but we really should be grateful to have a somewhat mainstream open-source browser with a great ecosystem of extensions and ability to turn off the telemetry. It could’ve been much worse

onlinepersona ,

We should really be grateful Google is providing a mainstream opensource browser with a great ecosystem of extensions

I see no problem with this logic.

Anti Commercial-AI license

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

Chromium is pretty good too but usually it’s not recommended to support because nobody wants its engine to become an absolute monopoly and make all major websites in the world broken on any other one. Though nobody wants Firefox’s engine to become an absolute monopoly too so it’s nice that Chromium exists

TheAnonymouseJoker ,
@TheAnonymouseJoker@lemmy.ml avatar

Manifest V3. Enough said.

Blisterexe ,

Opt-in telemetry is useless telemetry, they make it opt-out because its the only way to get representative numbers

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

Why do you need unwilling representing numbers in the first place? Just ask advanced users on the official forum about what they want to see added. You only really need error logs that are absolutely opt-in

jackalope ,

“advanced users” on forums are rarely very representive of users as a whole.

Blisterexe ,

I have not seen a single case where advanced users have the same opinions as the average one

drwho ,
@drwho@beehaw.org avatar

The number of people who actually change their default settings is quite small. Those of us who have these discussions are a distinct minority in the sum userbase.

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

I used this fact a lot in arguments and I agree. What I’m saying is that it could be worse

drwho ,
@drwho@beehaw.org avatar

And I agree with you.

TheFeatureCreature ,
@TheFeatureCreature@lemmy.world avatar

The important part that you should know (and should already be using):

Remember, you can always opt out of sending any technical or usage data to Firefox. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to adjust your settings.

Sneptaur ,
@Sneptaur@pawb.social avatar

Importantly, if you have already opted out of sending data to Mozilla, this change will not affect you. It only sends data if you have the setting turned on. It takes just a few clicks to entirely disable it, and Mozilla deletes all record of your browser within 30 days from turning off this feature. If you’re worried about it, do it now, it’s just under Settings > Privacy & Security. Instructions are also linked in the blog post.

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

I’m not a fan of the telemetry being enabled by default but having the option to completely disable it makes it not that bad. Though Mozilla definitely doesn’t need search history data (unless the law enforcements told them to collect it) so this change is kinda sus

Sneptaur ,
@Sneptaur@pawb.social avatar

It seems like a profit-driven thing to me. Big piles of anonymized data are worth a pretty penny.

ID411 ,

Mozilla famous non-profit status notwithstanding of course

fartsparkles ,

Mozilla Foundation has a wholly owned subsidiary that is Mozilla Corporation that is for-profit.

For instance the revenue from Google, so they’re the default search engine, is seen by Mozilla Corporation. So things search-related will indeed be part of their for-profit arm.

ID411 ,

I’d like to read more on that if you have anything. Seems like too big a loophole ?

fartsparkles ,

It’s not a loophole. As a subsidiary, profits are still invested into the nonprofit and they’re still guided by the Mozilla manifesto. It just lets them do more and raise more funds which would be difficult to do with nonprofit status (selling default search engine for instance). Here’s their original press release when they incorporated Mozilla Corporation in 2005.

Vincent ,

It’s technically for profit, but it has a single shareholder: the Foundation. There are no greedy shareholders that can get rich off of that profit.

Of course, employees/board members can be richly compensated, but that’s independent of for-/non-profit status.

Sneptaur ,
@Sneptaur@pawb.social avatar

A non-profit can, in fact, profit, but it has specific rules on what it can do with those profits. Tax law is a rabbit hole and I don’t even wanna peer in

OldManBOMBIN ,

Used to work for a non-profit retirement community in a pretty small area; the guy running the joint lived in a $3M “house” with a full 7 car garage.

Vex_Detrause ,

Enshitification hits every company, even Mozilla.

anachronist ,

Unfortunately Mozilla is being run by a McKinsey consultant.

Vincent ,

From what I read in their blog post, nobody is keeping your search history data. It only tracks how often people in general search for things in specific categories, so nobody will be able to learn anything about you specifically from that data.

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

Then what’s the point in collecting such data? It won’t help to fix bugs, add new features or even make useful statistics to show publicly. Only personalized ads is what comes to mind. Yes it seems to be anonymized well enough but still ad companies love such data. Maybe Mozilla wants to implement a custom ads functionality that uses this data or they just want to sell it idk. Still changes in this direction are kinda sus

Vincent ,

I believe there was an experiment making weather data more accessible through the URL bar, e.g. when people start searching for weather there, which could be useful. Presumably, telemetry like this can help determine which of such features to prioritise.

I could indeed also imagine ads, but then not based on keeping a file on you with all your interests and sharing that with advertisers, but by locally choosing between a couple of categories of ads and showing the ones that are related to your current search, without anyone having to know what you’re actually searching for.

Carol2852 ,
@Carol2852@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

First thing I do on every Firefox installation on every device. 3 clicks and most of this nonsense stops.

I’d appreciate Mozilla not doing something like that in the first place, maybe don’t try to build products and focus on the browser. 🤷‍♂️

Sneptaur ,
@Sneptaur@pawb.social avatar

I’d just like for these things to be opt-in, not opt-out.

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