Tos copy updates (fix #16016) (#16018) · mozilla/bedrock@d459add
github.com
* ToS copy updates (fix #16016) * Apply suggestions from code review - copy change Co-authored-by: maureenlholland <maureen@silverorange.com> --------- Co-authored-by: maureenlholland <...

Mozilla has just deleted the following:

“Does Firefox sell your personal data?”

“Nope. Never have, never will. And we protect you from many of the advertisers who do. Firefox products are designed to protect your privacy. That’s a promise. "

Source: Lundke journal.

  • Jack@lemmy.caEnglish
    0·
    3 hours ago

    “never will” “promise”

    I do not think these words mean what you think they mean.

  • Jerti@lemm.eeEnglish
    0·
    7 hours ago

    What a shame. I tried waterfox for the first time and I got a good first impression. Will probably switch to it.

    • IDew@lemm.ee
      0·
      7 hours ago

      In December 2019, System1, an advertising (paid notice) company that claims to be focused on privacy, bought Waterfox. In July 2023, Alex Kontos said that Waterfox is an independent and separate project again.

      I’m rather unsure about what is truly going on behind the scenes, but my trust in them is far to find…

      Source

  • ghurab@lemmy.world
    0·
    9 hours ago

    They removed that question from the FAQ, but it still states in multiple other sections, in the same link, that they do not sell user data.

    Am I reading this wrong?

    • Croquette@sh.itjust.works
      0·
      4 hours ago

      I am so fucking tired of PR speak. This is removed now so that they can sell your data later. That and the ToS change is the canary in the coalmine.

      “We akchually don’t sell your data because it isn’t the legal definition everywhere”. Fuck you

    • Vincent@feddit.nl
      0·
      8 hours ago

      I feel like it would’ve been really helpful if it had provided an example of something that legally counts as “selling your data”, but that any sane person would not define as such.

    • TheObviousSolution@kbin.melroy.org
      0·
      8 hours ago

      Ah, so it’s not that they sell data, it’s that they share data in order to achieve commercial viability. I don’t sell items on ebay, I share them in a commercially viable way!

    • Dave@lemmy.nz
      0·
      9 hours ago

      To some extent they have changed the wording, as clarified here: https://github.com/mozilla/bedrock/commit/d459addab846d8144b61939b7f4310eb80c5470e#commitcomment-153095625

      Saying the new wording is:

      “Mozilla doesn’t sell data about you (in the way that most people think about “selling data“), and we don’t buy data about you. Since we strive for transparency, and the LEGAL definition of “sale of data“ is extremely broad in some places, we’ve had to step back from making the definitive statements you know and love. We still put a lot of work into making sure that the data that we share with our partners (which we need to do to make Firefox commercially viable) is stripped of any identifying information, or shared only in the aggregate, or is put through our privacy preserving technologies (like OHTTP).”

      Which seems to be because of the legal definition of selling data. Note this quote is now live on their privacy FAQ: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/faq/

      However, this part:

      We still put a lot of work into making sure that the data that we share with our partners (which we need to do to make Firefox commercially viable)

      Sounds an awful lot like straight up selling our data. It would be nice to have specifics. The privacy FAQ page doesn’t seem to actually provide clarity.

      • Vincent@feddit.nl
        0·
        7 hours ago

        Yeah, specifics would be great. “Someone clicked this ad”, or potentially even “someone in Germany clicked this ad” is a big difference from “a 20-year old man who likes blahaj in Hamburg has opened a new tab”.

  • jonesy@aussie.zone
    0·
    9 hours ago

    I’ve been using Mozilla since version 1.0, and have gone through the highs and lows. This is the point where I get off, what a shame.

  • gon [he]@lemm.eeEnglish
    0·
    9 hours ago

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

    OK, Mozilla, I’ll use a damn fork, since you insist! WTF…

    • RedSnt 👓♂️🖥️@feddit.dk
      0·
      7 hours ago

      That’s a good way of putting it. I feel like some of us might return to monkey and just use gopher again, reject the corpo bullshit ways of siphoning every ounce of data out of our existence.

    • fartsparkles@lemmy.world
      0·
      8 hours ago

      I’m kind of worried about the knee jerk reactions from people that haven’t read the full communications from Mozilla or looked into their approaches to anonymise data (which they’ve done for years as part of analyzing new feature tests).

      Building an application as complex as Firefox requires full-time developers. It’s similar in scale to the Linux Kernel.

      To keep building a competitive browser and continue to challenge there ubiquity of Chromium, Firefox needs to exist. Mozilla need to figure out how to make money (their previous attempts at additional services like VPN etc didn’t have much impact). If Google pull the rug from under them regarding their payments to be the default search engine, Mozilla could swiftly fall under.

      Advertising, done in a privacy preserving way which they’ve an awful lot of experience at doing, in the near term gives them additional revenue streams to keep the ship afloat.

      If we lose Firefox, Google owns the internet. We need to keep talking with Mozilla, not abandon them.

      • gon [he]@lemm.eeEnglish
        0·
        7 hours ago

        That’s fair, but I think not totally right.

        I think Firefox is a great browser, which is why I’m using forks, not ditching it entirely. I still use Mozilla services, and I will continue to keep tabs on and support the development of the browser. However, I will not sacrifice the little privacy I can scrape up by agreeing to terms of use that gather my data, even if anonymized, for use in serving me ads, regardless of whether I think the company behind these practices needs to exist or not—and in this case, I do think Mozilla, and Firefox as a project, must remain strong if we want a free internet for all.

        This implicit trust you seem to have in Mozilla, however, is not something I share. First, AI integration, then it’s the terms of use, then it’s the language around data privacy… Google used to say “Don’t Be Evil.” I don’t believe Mozilla will stay good because it’s Mozilla and it’s been good. I don’t like the recent steps they’ve been taking, and so I’ll stop using Firefox; that’s as far as it goes.

        Maybe I’m being unreasonable, but I don’t want to compromise on this.

        • fartsparkles@lemmy.world
          0·
          7 hours ago

          I don’t think you’re being unreasonable and in truth I share your concerns. Forks are doing a good job at refining the experience but should the Firefox project collapse, I doubt any fork can meaningfully continue the development needed for such a huge and complex project without the full-time and experienced development team who have been working on the project for an incredibly long time.

          I wish Mozilla could figure out a more powerful way to generate revenue that doesn’t require advertising in any form.

          I wonder if a yearly fundraising drive like Wikipedia could help. They generated $250Mil+ last time they did.

          • gon [he]@lemm.eeEnglish
            0·
            6 hours ago

            should the Firefox project collapse, I doubt any fork can meaningfully continue the development

            Yeah, that’s probably right, unfortunately.

            I wonder if a yearly fundraising drive like Wikipedia could help.

            I doubt it would hurt, at least! They do get some money, <$20M… Which isn’t close to being enough, of course, but it does prove there’s at least some interest in supporting Mozilla financially, on the users’ side.