Mozilla is Introducing 'Terms of Use' to Firefox | Also about to go into effect is an updated privacy notice
Mozilla is Introducing 'Terms of Use' to Firefox | Also about to go into effect is an updated privacy notice
Hot off the back of its recent leadership rejig, Mozilla has announced users of Firefox will soon be subject to a 'Terms of Use' policy — a first for the
Hot off the back of its recent leadership rejig, Mozilla has announced users of Firefox will soon be subject to a ‘Terms of Use’ policy — a first for the iconic open source web browser.
This official Terms of Use will, Mozilla argues, offer users ‘more transparency’ over their ‘rights and permissions’ as they use Firefox to browse the information superhighway — as well well as Mozilla’s “rights” to help them do it, as this excerpt makes clear:
You give Mozilla all rights necessary to operate Firefox, including processing data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice, as well as acting on your behalf to help you navigate the internet.
When you upload or input information through Firefox, you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox.
Also about to go into effect is an updated privacy notice (aka privacy policy). This adds a crop of cushy caveats to cover the company’s planned AI chatbot integrations, cloud-based service features, and more ads and sponsored content on Firefox New Tab page.
Oh, that last paragraph doesn't give me hope at all. Fucking AI chatbots.
The actual addition to the terms is essentially this:
- If you choose to use the optional AI chatbot sidebar feature, you're subject to the ToS and Privacy Policy of the provider you use, just as if you'd gone to their site and used it directly. This is obvious.
- Mozilla will collect light data on usage, such as how frequently people use the feature overall, and how long the strings of text are that are being pasted in. That's basically it.
The way this article describes it as "cushy caveats" is completely misleading. It's quite literally just "If you use a feature that integrates with third party services, you're relying on and providing data to those services, also we want to know if the feature is actually being used and how much."
Privacy policies should legally be called surveillance policies.
Or "Invasion of Privacy" Policy
The only acceptable privacy policy for a browser is "we won't fucking look into anything, take anything, nor send anything anywhere you didn't actually wish to send explicitly".
Firefox have an extension system. If mozilla wants to bloat it, they should do it via extension, so that they're not bloating the actually useful part. As it is, all they're doing is forcing more work on people to manage forks to remove all the shit every time they push a release.
/usr/lib/firefox-esr/browser/features
has- formautofill@mozilla.org.xpi
- pictureinpicture@mozilla.org.xpi
- screenshots@mozilla.org.xpi
- webcompat-reporter@mozilla.org.xpi
- webcompat@mozilla.org.xpi
Good thing LibreWolf and other forks exist, including hard forks like the Goanna browsers.
Overhyped AI is going to fail, and it can't happen soon enough. The Mozilla leadership really needs to pay attention to that reality.
Mozilla leadership needs to be removed
It just became bigger: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-leadership-growth-planning-updates/
100%. I can't decide whether I think the organization being dissolved completely is a good idea or not, but I'm at least open to it.
It's not going to disappear, it has its place, but its not going to be shoehorned into every single thing.
Sorry, I realized I'm using my personal jargon in public again. When I said "AI," I meant this overhyped put-it-in-your-mouse garbage. When I'm talking about the actually useful stuff, I usually call it "ML."
Of course you have no reason to know that or care. My apologies.
i know, but companies still think AI is a replacement of : software engineers, programmers down the line, and outsourcing all thier CS. instead its just rehashing other AI content into its own. they have a place for answering simple questions, or pulling up complex programs
i think MS? admitted AI isnt generating useful profit for them, yea its hype like crypto is.
Well, we had a good run lads, enshitification is here.
Any recommendations for open source alternatives that are convenient and also have an android app supporting ublock origin.
Librewolf, Servo looks promising but is very far off and just an engine I think? Idk I keep looking at it and want it.
Waterfox
Not really open source, but want to mention it anyways. Take a look at the Norwegian browser Vivaldi. I made the switch recently and am really happy with it. Their privacy policy seems good, and they have a clear no AI stance. Their android browser is by far the best android browser from a UX standpoint in my opinion.
I might be biased as a Norwegian 😉
Yeah, I'll +1 Vivaldi - great tool with (mostly) useful features
Not sure how it will do with the Chrome / Chromium v3 addon API thingie - just not looked into that at all. Hope it's not relevant
Mange tak! 😁
Wtf is happening, why is now even Firefox going off the rails?
You missed the previous memo: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-leadership-growth-planning-updates/
The writing was on the wall when the Mozilla Corporation was setup under the Foundation. A bunch of SF venture capital types have places on the board, and are in operational leadership, and are slowly transforming Mozilla into a shitty for-profit tech venture. Ads, data collection, subscription services, and a chat bot.
probably saw all the money by having thier browsers info being sold off to companies, like with chrome, and google and reddit/OPEN AI collusion.
Is this because some middle manager at Mozilla has to pretend to be productive?
No it’s because Firefox isn’t profitable and to try to survive in its current form they have to do something.
It might be more productive to die and live on as an open source effort. I personally doubt there’s enough open source engagement to keep Firefox current and competitive but it’s of course an alternative Mozilla in its current form is unable to consider.
Mozilla is a nonprofit (or it at least it should be, technically it's a for profit corporation that's wholly owned by a nonprofit foundation, shady asf).
They shouldn't be trying to make a profit, they should make enough money to pay their programmers to maintain the browser.
They should not be dumping money into more executive hires and AI bullshit like they are doing.
they have to dip something for sure. THEY HAVE TO REDUCE THE CEO PAY BY MEASLY 20% AND FUND DEVELOPMENT FROM THAT!!!
or by even more.
I've been willingly enabling data collection features for Mozilla but I guess that time is revolute, they don't feel trustworthy anymore.
Same here. Just turned off all data collection checkboxes. Fuck Mozilla!
and then, "uh, we are removing the URL bar in the next version because our statistics say nobody uses it!!"
and then, "uh, we are removing the URL bar in the next version because our statistics say nobody uses it!!"
So now what the hell do we have to use to not be spied upon?
Well I suppose LibreWolf (or some other de-branded Firefox) will become more mainstream. Similar to what chromium is to chrome 🤷
In the good/bad old days a web page was just text and images but now a browser is a platform for running software. Each website can do useful computing for the user but the software author is in control and always tempted to make it run for them at the expenve of the user.
Crazy idea, maybe we shouldn't use web browsers.
Soon other web engine will coming, first LadyBird browser and two is Servo Browser. But they're still along way to go
I am still waiting desperately for a servo based browser, mozilla kicking it out was one of the reasons I lost all hope in Mozilla a while back.
soon! they can come any year now!
probably anti-detection browser that ban evaders are using on reddit. its a little more complicated to get to that point though.
Librewolf is still a good alternative
ladybird can't come fast enough
For realsies
Damn we really can't have anything nice.
Guys Mullvad browser and Librewolf exist.
Zen Browser too
Do they support ubo?
they're firefox forks and ubo comes automatically installed with them.
I have librewolf, don't use it much. Is it functionally the same as FF? In terms of plug-in and website compatibility.
Most consumer sites are optimized for chrome and even safari, firefox & Edge (Obviously) face issues with scripts and plug-ins.
It's basically the same, but the devil is in the detail. DRM disabled from the get go, which is a show stopper for some sites (say, netflix). Some sites will bork themselve on the strange user-agent. Some advanced privacy features are quite hard to disable willingly, which may or may not be a good thing if you actually have to get things done on sites that breaks.
One would argue that sites that breaks when privacy features are enforced are not worth it, but you don't always have a choice in that regard.
Most consumer sites are optimized for chrome and even safari, firefox & Edge (Obviously) face issues with scripts and plug-ins.
This is why it's dangerous that Chrome has such a large amount of market share. Instead of using standard features, sites are using Chrome-specific features and even relying on Chrome bugs that don't exist in other browsers. It's exactly the same reason Internet Explorer was bad.
LibreWolf is annoying in that it doesn't work on my Mac with VPN split tunneling, a seemingly known issue they haven't fixed.
Get ready for ads as well
They removed this:
{ "@type": "Question", "name": "Does Firefox sell your personal data?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "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. " } },Turns out when you gotta choose between going defunct and selling ad space, selling ad space wins.
Also turns out that drying up donations for privacy protecting browsers means there is less demand for it, and less money to fund it.
The majority cost of Firefox is engineering salaries.
Eventually something has to give, and this is it.
Yeah but the line between them and google is not there anymore in that case
Also turns out that drying up donations for privacy protecting browsers means there is less demand for it
Or, hear me out, that former donors don't trust them anymore!
But also that a lot of people don't want to donate, basically when they could only donate an immeasurably small amount, to a company whose CEO gets an unimaginably huge pay, that could be used for significantly boosting development.
Personally that's a big reason I rather want to support smaller projects, or even that of size like Bitwarden.Cough cough, that's true the biggest cost is salary 17,097,933. But 10 millions are paid to C-Suite and 4mil to contractors who do the job. https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2024/b200-mozilla-foundation-form-990-public-disclosure-ty23.pdf Just look into the books.
This comment under the article gave me a chuckle.
Yeesh. So what's an alternative?
I'm very happy with librewolf on desktop and ironfox on mobile
Same.
To add to the list:
Mullvad browser (pc only) (removes blobs,proprietary crap, telemetry, and is otherwise hardened and was developed in partnership with the tor org. Some prefs are fine to change but you're best off by leaving as is.
Tor browser - nuff said. If you want anonymity use this. Don't change any prefs.
Arkenfox has a nodded user.is file you can simply drop into your current ff profile dir. It includes many hidden prefs and settings and allows you to customize for your needs/threat model.
Arkenfox's mods are used by other privacy friendly browsers. As are some tor mods.
If you can find your way around about:config and don't mind some learning, you can achieve most of the results of hardened broswers.
There are guides to further harden your ff. Search for Hardened Firefox.
LibreWolf, or if you can tolerate some breakage, PaleMoon or Basilisk (I say 'if you can tolerate some breakage' because Goanna is hard-forked from old ESR code, and PaleMoon and Basilisk are both Goanna-based).
As I understand it, these changes don't affect browsers that use FF as a base, so Zen Browser might not be affected.
I've been trying it out this week, and it's good. And can still use all the FF extensions.
waterfox
This one says that waterfox also has Google and Mozilla telemetry, but I guess you can turn it off? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfox
Chromium I guess? Let’s wait and see first.
How in the absolute fuck is chromium an alternative?
Man all this makes me want to just use Links2 for everything and being a luddite. Complete with cabin in the woods. So frustrating.
There's a links2!?!?!?
can a chromium fork reasonably be maintained with adblock support?
This new policy doesn't apply to Firefox forks so you're better off with one of those
That would be getting right back in bed with Google, gross.
i also hate it, but i see no one else putting the amount of work necessary to maintain an entire browser engine. and mozilla clearly wants to enshittify.
firefox has its days numbered. even if its not overnight and we have some time, we have to come up with something.
anyone up to date on how servo is doing rn, btw?
Thorium certainly does https://thorium.rocks/
Brave supports extensions still but it has its own issues.
It's getting hard to boycott companies and products when it starting to look like most are dipping their toes into stuff their users don't like.
Is Waterfox a good alternative?
Waterfox's creator, while not being HOSTILE to privacy, has said in the past that making the most private browser in the world is not the goal of the project. The goal is a more customizable browser for power users
does this affect forks?
Where's the gofundme for the firefox fork project?
Was this from google turning off the funding tap?
I feel like everything is getting corroded, the capitalists are wearing down everything
I moved on to Waterfox, is this a good move?
sometimes bound to give, if firefox isnt taking in money from having no ads, to having ads. they are going to need tons of ads, and the ability to sell your browser info for money, much like chrome is doing. surprised its taken this long to finally say "private donations isnt enough"
Looking forward to seeing the cope from the Mozilla fanboys for that one.
waterfox waterfox waterfox