I don’t understand how they are supposed to “sell your data” if you just never use a Mozilla account and uncheck all the telemetry. Its not like they can secretly steal your data, since its Open Source.
It seems to me like just more FUD that Google is spreading to undermine our trust in free software.
The problem is that a reduction in trust correlates to a reduction in users. A reduction in Firefox increases Chromium’s dominance on the web, which is a near monopoly already. A monopoly on web renderers in turn is bad for open web standards.
People worried about Mozilla surely won’t migrate to chrome, will they?
Why not? Or at least if people are choosing a browser they might not see the benefits of Firefox and just see that chromium is more spread and thus more compatible and “user friendly” (whatever that means). If Firefox isn’t better than chrome, why not switch over to the bigger one…(?)
I’m a software developer, and understand the technicalities and options available to me. I am capable of forking Firefox and make myself a custom build with anything I don’t like stripped out. (Capable of, not wanting to.)
They removed “We don’t sell your data and we never will” from their FAQ and they added “We may sell your data” to the ToS.
I am unhappy about this change. It is a clear sign that the people in charge of Firefox want to sell user data, and that the irrecoverable enshittification path has been chosen. It means that at some point in the next few years, I can’t trust Firefox’ with my privacy. And they sure as fuck don’t have anything else going for them: The browser eats memory and freezes my camera during video conferencing, and is plain not supported in some of the software I use at work.
The rationale is probably something entirely reasonable, like “While we do not intend to sell user data, the phrasing was too vague and not helpful. What is selling, and what is user data, really?” An organization with strong privacy values would be so far from anything “bad” that the phrasing as it was would not be a problem for them.
It’s irrelevant that right now privacy settings and xyz and telmentry is clear and opt in etc. Because the point is that they are gearing up to change that. The settings will be less clear, user data will be separated into shit like “operability assistance”, “personal information”, “experience improvement metrics” with some of it enabled by default because, etc.
Mozilla is changing the license used for the Firefox executable/binary. The TOS will be the governing license over Firefox, the branded browser executable. It will no longer be open source, as defined by the Open Source Initiative, as users are no longer free to use the software however they want. Firefox will now be source available.
The source code for the browser, is (at least as of this comment) FOSS under the MPL2 license. People are free to recompile the browser under a different name (e.g. Librewolf, Waterfox, etc.).
This is not FUD. I read through the new TOS, Acceptable Use Policy, and Privacy Policy. Since the browser executable was governed under the MPL2, there was little concern from the open source community. I made my judgement from those documents alone.
how are they supposed to “sell your data”
First step is collecting it. Putting provisions to grab everything from the software you installed on your device and use to do everything is a good start. Second step is selling it. Data broker loves data, surprisingly. And even small, inconsequential stuff can go a long way when you can correlate with dozens, or hundreds, of data points.
if you just never use a Mozilla account
Given how it’s implemented, the data pushed inside your account may be in a safer place than what you use the browser to do daily at this point.
and uncheck all the telemetry
Funny thing. Even with everything unchecked/disabled/toggled off/whatever, there’s a handful of ping back and other small reports that are configured to go out. You can turn these off using the complete config page; the one that warns people that its dangerous and have no clear way to know what most of its options do.
Its not like they can secretly steal your data, since its Open Source
If by “secretly” you mean without us knowing, it would be hard indeed, as long as people did look into the source AND the built images were faithful to the source, too. They are not doing it secretly, at least for now, anyway. That’s the point of their “privacy notice” that includes basically everything, which they then use as a safeguard saying "we can’t do shit (unless specified in the privacy notice).
It seems to me like just more FUD that Google is spreading to undermine our trust in free software
The policy changes comes from Mozilla. Were written, published, and updated by Mozilla, on their blog (and legal pages). What the fuck are you talking about with Google?
Heck, if you knew 2cts about this, Google actually low-key needs Firefox to exists as a counterpoint to Chrome’s hegemony, unless they want another trial for being too good at their job.
