Latest Mozilla VPN features

https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2021/03/30/latest-mozilla-vpn-features-keep-your-data-safe/

by alexrustic • 5 years ago

243 169 5 years ago

blog.mozilla.org

Isn't Mozilla VPN just rebranded Mullvad? The only difference is that you can get Mullvad anywhere and pay anonymously without any accounts.

Thursday032521• 5 years ago

It looks like it uses Mullvad servers, but is otherwise its own software.

It uses WireGuard, an open VPN protocol, so it's not necessarily forever anchored to Mullvad.

nargek• 5 years ago

Mullvad provides both OpenVPN and Wireguard.

RL_Quine2• 5 years ago

"Being its own software" is sort of meaningless.

It's Mozilla white labeling an anonymous VPN service (ie, we don't know who runs it).

forgotpwd16• 5 years ago

Also Mullvad's app has been audited.

zo12• 5 years ago

I'm curious - Have their servers and processes been subjected to any audit like that?

yoavm• 5 years ago

I don't understand what can be so hard about "supporting" more countries? It's the internet. Anyone can access your servers. International credit card charging was invent decades ago. Take my money.

eli• 5 years ago

Don't a bunch of countries have laws about VPNs?

tyingq2• 5 years ago

Probably that fraud detection doesn't work well enough in some countries to make more money than you spend. AVS, for example, is only available in the US, UK, and Canada. It sucks, but for some types of services, there's an army of people trying to use stolen CC numbers.

anoncake• 5 years ago

The only three countries that have sufficient fraud protection for AVS are anglophone? I don't think that is the (only) reason here.

opheliate3• 5 years ago

It's really disappointing to me that Mozilla VPN didn't support Linux from the get-go, and even now, from their FAQ [1], apparently only supports Ubuntu. The code for the client is open source, and can be built on other distributions, but the more pressing question to me is why their own client is necessary at all. Mullvad (which this VPN is based on) allows you to just download WireGuard/OpenVPN config files, which you can use with your own, more widely used/trusted client. The only reason I can see for Mozilla to require the use of their own client is to enforce their device limit, which really leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I don't think their desire to impose the device-limit should outweigh the security implications of disallowing me from using the standard WireGuard client.

I want to give Mozilla my money for this, but it's really annoying how unfriendly its implementation is.

1: https://www.mozilla.org/en-GB/products/vpn/#faq-compatibilit...

kfreds8• 5 years ago

Hi! I'm one of Mullvad's founders.

I can't speak for Mozilla, but we have our own desktop and mobile apps because it enables us to do more privacy-preserving things with a higher assurance. Consider for instance DNS leaks, Teredo leaks, IPv6 leaks, esoteric DHCP directives that can hack your routing tables, and so on.

And these are just a few of the things we were early in mitigating correctly. Consider also the tight relationship between UX and security, and it is clear that we can't rely on "generic VPN clients" to always agree with our design and security preferences. That doesn't mean they are wrong and we are right of course. It's just that we have a very specific mission.

One architecture decision we made for our app was to write its backend in Rust, and integrate tightly with the firewalls on Windows, macOS, and Linux. It facilitates stability and therefore reduces the risk of states where data leak outside of the tunnel. Check it out, it's open source. As all security-related things should be.

https://github.com/mullvad/mullvadvpn-app

Spivak4• 5 years ago

But it throws compatibility with devices that don't support your client out the window. Like I might want to have an entire VLAN on my home network route all traffic through the VPN which would happen through my router. But my router only supports common VPN protocols like IPSec, OpenVPN, and WireGuard.

Sure, I could make it work with a separate Linux server running your app and some routing but that's far more work than most other VPN providers.

I'm fine with warnings in your UI about connections with these protocols being "less secure" like how Zoom handles E2E with phones.

opheliate3• 5 years ago

Hi, thanks for the response. I'm a big fan of Mullvad's approach to creating a VPN, and I'm hopeful that more companies will follow in your path. I've been using your service for a few months now, and I'm really satisfied with it.

I should perhaps have been clearer when I referred to generic VPN clients, I was talking about the original WireGuard implementation by Jason Donenfeld, not just some random software, which I would hope you agree is a (sufficiently) secure implementation when used by technically proficient users? I do appreciate that there are reasons for having a specific client for your service, and it is absolutely necessary for those who are new to VPN apps, but I would hope you appreciate the reasons for providing implementation-agnostic WireGuard/OpenVPN config files, since your own service does so?

Regardless, thanks again for the work you're doing in this sector, and best of luck for the future.

tgragnato• 5 years ago

This is great for non-techies, but I want to control my own traffic, customize the behavior of my VPNs, ...

Any deviation from the standard implementation, open source or not, is a hindrance.

wintermutestwin2• 5 years ago

I thought Mullvad recommends WireGuard and that your app uses OpenVPN? On Mac, WireGuard is certainly faster to connect and more stable than the Mullvad app.

input_sh• 5 years ago

I absolutely love your service and will definitely renew it considering my one-year license is close to expiry.

Any reason why you don't use a PPA or something to auto-release updates? I've postponed an update quite a few times because the friction of going to your website, downloading it, and then upgrading the package is just a bit too much in certain situations.

Other than that my only gripe with the app is that I can't close it from the app indicator, but have to re-open it, click on the settings, and then choose "quit app".

zaarn• 5 years ago

The device limit is enforce on Mullvad's side already. It's 5 devices, even if you use other client (tracked by simultanously connecting IPs IIRC with some leeway for spikes).

Spivak4• 5 years ago

Like it's absolutely wild that their VPN implementation requires their client to work. Basically every other VPN provider will expose endpoints for IPSec, OpenVPN, WireGuard, etc. etc. for instant compatibility with clients that can't run your pretty app.

Sad that PIA tanked their rep because their Linux support was top notch. They even had a script that would set up NetworkManager profiles for you.

fullstop• 5 years ago

They still have scripts for generating configs manually -- maybe not NetworkManager, but I use it on a server to establish a wireguard tunnel.

https://github.com/pia-foss/manual-connections

pnutjam• 5 years ago

What "tanked their reputation"? I've been using them for years.

rubyist5eva2• 5 years ago

Killswitch and split tunneling are the only things that are keeping me from using it, I want to give Mozilla my money...come on man.

fulafel• 5 years ago

What does split tunneling mean in context of a public VPN?

rubyist5eva2• 5 years ago

I want to split the tunnelling from my local machine, I want certain (whitelisted) applications to bypass the VPN and everything else to use it.

cyberlab4• 5 years ago

I don't like that it's tied to your Mozilla account, which I never used anyway because I like to keep strictly local copies of my credentials using Keepass. Storing secrets in the cloud comes with a risk. Someone (hello NSA) will use your encrypted cloud-based vault as target practice and try to crack it. With a local copy, only I can access it.

maeln• 5 years ago

I feel like most of those VPN services are using very borderline marketing and like to keep a lot of information blurry.

As far as I know, in a lot of country (like France) it is a legal obligation to keep logs and be able to identify one of your customer if the police demands it. Therefore, if you have server in France or any country with similar rules, you can't operate a "0 log" service. And since those kinds of services have servers everywhere (and it is even one of their selling point), it is extremely unlikely that they don't keep you data and will hand it to the police (willingly or not) if requested.

And if their own server get breached, you can get the info of all the customers who used the breached server.

So I find the claim of those services that they provide "more privacy" pretty lousy. Yes they do hide your IP addresses, but that's far from being the only data use to fingerprint you. And if it is to protect you against a Wi-Fi that you don't trust or your ISP, sure it works, but you move the trust from them to your VPN provider.

Fighting against geofencing is good though.

cyberlab4• 5 years ago

I agree. A VPN should only ever be used for the following:

- Shifting traffic over a VPN when using untrusted/sketchy wifi hotspots

- Spoofing your geo-location to use geo-specific content

And that's it. If privacy is your goal, Tor is much more suitable since it's not a single-hop proxy like a VPN and compartments all your traffic. (But of course Tor is not a silver bullet and there are caveats).

sodality2• 5 years ago

What about avoiding copyright letters?

ComodoHacker• 5 years ago

- Routing traffic over untrusted home/office ISP

- Censorship circumvention

vehemenz3• 5 years ago

Depends on the VPN.

ExpressVPN is HK/CCP owned, so I wouldn't worry too much about my privacy being violated for petty copyright infringements (BitTorrent).

hnlmorg3• 5 years ago

What about tunnelling into a trusted network?

That's what a VPN is really for. The other uses are more side effects exploiting the encryption and tunnelling properties of VPN rather than the original intended purpose of a VPN.

qw3rty012• 5 years ago

Tor is explicitly not private, only anonymous. The end node can see all the traffic you send through it if it's not encrypted. If privacy is your main concern, tor is definitely not the right tool to use.

hendersoon3• 5 years ago

You're missing two major use-cases.

1) Piracy (the most common, I would imagine) 2) Evading content-blocking. For example, going to Facebook at work.

dgellow• 5 years ago

The entire VPN industry is really shady. Their marketing is entirely based on creating literal FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) and sell their service as the perfect and cheap solution. The presence they have on youtube ads and other mainstream platform ads is really disturbing.

kfreds8• 5 years ago

I hear what you're saying but that generalization isn't fair.

Check out IVPN for instance. They do a lot of things right:

https://www.ivpn.net/ethics/

xvector4• 5 years ago

Mullvad doesn’t do this, most providers do but I agree that this generalization is unfair to the VPN being discussed here.

dahfizz• 5 years ago

Another benefit is that VPNs raise the bar for investigation. You are not safe from the FBI or interpol, but for "petty crimes" like pirating you are safe(r).

Comcast basically has automated the process of sending you a cease and desist if they detect you are torrenting something you shouldn't. Mozilla doesn't.

kfreds8• 5 years ago

As far as I know, in a lot of country (like France) it is a legal obligation to keep logs and be able to identify one of your customer if the police demands it.

Not for all types of services. ISPs are sometimes under obligation to log, but VPN services don't belong in that category.

I can't speak for others but we have contacts with legal experts (in a few jurisdictions) that alert us to changing laws. Ultimately if a country required us to start logging we would just cancel all of our machines there and leave.

On the topic of trustworthiness, you are completely right of course that VPN users put a lot of trust in their VPN provider. There is also the lemon market aspect - the information and competence asymmetry between user and operator. That begs the question of how to ascertain trustworthiness.

We think things like this help:

https://mullvad.net/blog/2018/10/17/signals-trustworthy-vpns...

https://mullvad.net/blog/2019/6/3/system-transparency-future...

chelmzy• 5 years ago

Are you an employee at Mullvad? Just want to say thank you for the excellent product and does Mullvad plan to except Monero in the future?

potency2• 5 years ago

I would love to use Mullvad, but I need split tunneling on a per-process basis (Windows), since there is the occasional website that hates VPN-based servers. I have a special browser installation I use for such occasions, but few VPN providers offer per-process VPN exceptions. Any chance Mullvad is considering this feature?

kibwen• 5 years ago

You're correct that scummy, overselling advertisements make the whole VPN industry look bad, but Mozilla's VPN is provided by Mullvad, who doesn't engage in those sorts of advertisements.

FWIW, I've looked into Mullvad and even had beers with some of their programmers (all of whom appeared to be Scandinavian anarchist/anti-authoritarian types) and I think Mozilla made an good choice with that partnership. (Of course, don't take my word for it; do your own research, or just host your own VPN.)

2OEH8eoCRo0• 5 years ago

Mullvad is the bees knees. The cats meow.

ForHackernews• 5 years ago

Here, I'll get this over with quick:

Argle bargle Mozilla bad something something Pocket integration, Firefox isn't even that fast grr Brendan Eich, one time Thunderbird loaded a tracking pixel.

vehemenz3• 5 years ago

You forgot dropping XUL extension support

warabe• 5 years ago

Off topic, but...

Is Mozilla VPN going to be available in other countries in near future? I would like to hear the roadmap from Mozilla folks. I live in Japan and am wondering when it would become available in my country...

Shadonototro• 5 years ago

what's the added value compared to just using mullvad?

seems like a way for mozilla to gain shares without much effort? kinda disappointing

admax88q2• 5 years ago

The rise of VPNs signals to me that we as an industry have given up on end to end encryption. Instead VPNs try to encrypt the "first hop" with the assumption or hope that the networks further down the line are "secure"

Being on an "unsecured" local network shouldnt be an issue for security.

EveYoung2• 5 years ago

How has the industry given up on encryption? In recent years, HTTPS became the new standard and most apps are forced to use encrypted connections as well. Just because VPN ads are calling local networks "unsecure" doesn't mean that they are a true risk.

admax88q2• 5 years ago

Not encryption in general, but end to end encryption.

jonny383• 5 years ago

Mozilla: a corporation funded by a spying company with a recent shady record of injecting stuff into products secretely (hello Mr robot). What could go wrong in this thought crime?

jrootabega• 5 years ago

No warrant canary, from what I can see.

kijin• 5 years ago

I would prefer something a bit more granular than changing my device's network configuration and sending all of its traffic through the same VPN. Just because I want to watch a movie through a server in another country doesn't mean that I also want my video chat app or stock trading app to take the same detour.

Since this is Mozilla, how about a Firefox extension that passes all Firefox traffic through a VPN, like Tor Browser does, but doesn't touch any other app? That would differentiate it from most of the other VPN offerings out there. Currently my go-to solution is to set up a local SOCKS proxy with an SSH tunnel and point Firefox at it. It's good enough for testing, but not all services work properly when accessed that way.

npteljes• 5 years ago

I completely agree with this. If Firefox worked this way, or even just some special tabs of it, that would be great. Brave has TOR tabs AFAIR. Also an easy to use app would be great that can manage other apps' network connections - some could be blocked, some could be redirected through a VPN, etc.

acatton3• 5 years ago

I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the beginning. They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. They don't even do the server side, but just resell Mullvad's infrastructure with their brand.

I'm already a Mullvad customer, and if I were to switch to Mozilla VPN:

* It would not be available in my country (Germany) right away

* I would have to join a waitlist

* I would have to pay with my credit card, instead of cash-by-mail. (Great privacy improvement! /s)

* I would have to use Mozilla's GUI instead of the wg-quick CLI. (The use of wg-quick is documented by Mullvad in addition to Mullvad's GUI, but I haven't found any wg-quick documentation on Mozilla VPN)

All of this for the same infrastructure, the same service (number of devices, ...) at the same price. What the hell are you doing Mozilla?!

Black101• 5 years ago

If Mullvad doesn't know who the customers are, that would be the only possible upside?

Cu3PO42• 5 years ago

But they don't really know that anyway. Your account is just a number and when you mail cash you include a token that they can tie to your account number.

Obviously they could log your IP address (which they promise not to), but that's an issue even if you go through Mozilla to purchase the service.

Fergusonb• 5 years ago

If you're using mullvad you have likely already done a lot of research on which provider you want to use.

A lot of consumers are interested in a quality VPN but wouldn't do this kind of research.

Mozilla provide additional eyeballs and billing support, and mullvad provides the service itself. It's a mutually beneficial transaction.

They're not in competition for your money, they're targeting different demographics.

lucideer4• 5 years ago

they're targeting different demographics

This is the question though: who are these demographics?

I know Mozilla likely have a lot more data on this than I, but who is using Firefox / interested enough in Mozilla to read their marketing & research their VPN offerings, but is simultaneously not someone who would research VPN providers in general / use Mullvad? What is this techie/non-techie interested/not-interested hybrid person?

kyawzazaw2• 5 years ago

A lot of consumers are interested in a quality VPN but wouldn't do this kind of research.

In that case, they will probably use NordVPN or ProtonVPN

baseballdork• 5 years ago

I was also a mullvad customer and wanted to switch to Mozilla VPN specifically because it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser. At the time they didn't support linux at all, but someone wrote a tool[0] to squirt out the necessary configs to use with wg-quick. When I saw that, I pulled the trigger and haven't looked back.

[0] https://github.com/NilsIrl/MozWire

lucideer4• 5 years ago

it seems to be one of the only ways to support the browser

Is this the case? Is income from Mozilla VPN put toward Firefox development?

If it is, that info should be front-and-centre; they'd have a lot more customers I think.

IgorPartola4• 5 years ago

I signed up for Mozilla VPN instead of Mullvad for a two reasons:

1. It was priced in USD.

2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts.

jorvi• 5 years ago

2. The price is a flat monthly $5. They don't offer discounts for longer contracts.

This is something Mulvad has been doing since 2009..

https://mullvad.net/en/pricing

dewey• 5 years ago

It's as simple as that: You are not the target group.

If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product they get a million results, all with different deals and they'd have to figure out how to find the best one and will still be around in a year. If they already trust the Mozilla brand they'll go with that. Just like people go with stock apps on their computer over some maybe better third party app.

JohnBooty• 5 years ago

     If a regular consumer searches for a VPN product 
     they [...] have to figure out how to find the best 
     one and will still be around in a year.

Yep! It's a Mozilla product, so there's no guesswork and no worry. You know it won't be around in a year!

duxup• 5 years ago

I like Mullvad and supporting Mozilla.

unethical_ban• 5 years ago

They bring their brand name

To someone who isn't a leet hacker or SW dev, that is the ball game. Firefox and Mozilla aren't household, but millions of less-technical people know of them. Rather than getting their VPN (if they even know the value proposition) from some podcast advertisement, Mozilla is saying "Hey, this kind of service gives you privacy and we stand behind it".

I use it upon occasion. It's dead simple to purchase, set up on any OS and I trust Mozilla not to send me to a shady backend.

If you already have VPN and they don't offer it in your country, they clearly aren't targeting you.

jraph• 5 years ago

It would not be available in my country (Germany) right away

You could use a VPN to make it look like you are in a supported country.

Iv• 5 years ago

They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name.

Isn't it the most important thing for a VPN provider? You want a company that is privacy-conscious, not one that logs your traffic and sells it or open it to the various TLAs of the world.

skinkestek2• 5 years ago

I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN?

Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation.

This way at least they pass through the hands of the organization that does the most important work.

(Nothing against the other issues but right now the browser should be their top priority and I was massively annoyed when I found that donations towards the foundation couldn't be used for browser development and the browser.)

acatton3• 5 years ago

Supporting browser development instead of Mozilla Foundation.

But is it going towards Browser development though? https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html

Or is it going towards executive salaries?

wnevets• 5 years ago

They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name.

That has been enough for me. I generally trust Mozilla when they say privacy first and if I'm going to give my money to a VPN provider I rather give it to Mozilla than say NordVPN.

passivate• 5 years ago

I genuinely don't understand what is the incentive for using Mozilla VPN? I'm a Mozilla and Firefox fanboy, but this new product had me sceptical since the beginning. They literally bring nothing to the table except their brand name. They don't even do the server side, but just resell Mullvad's infrastructure with their brand.

The incentive for you is that Mozilla will keep Mullvad under close watch and make sure promises are kept - so you don't have to. Furthermore, there is no limitation for Mozilla to not seek other partnerships and/or develop the server side service themselves - they have the in-house dev talent to do so.

So, yes, they do bring quite a lot to the table besides their brand name.

givemeanaccount• 5 years ago

* I would have to pay with my credit card, instead of cash-by-mail. (Great privacy improvement! /s)

Do you download your configurations from the Mullvad website over Tor via their onion service 100% of the time?

Do you connect to Tor before connecting to Mullvad in your VPN client?

acatton3• 5 years ago

"IP" is a much more private datapoint than "Credit card number" and "First name, Last Name".

I'm not afraid of governments knowing who/what I do. I'm afraid of private companies holding private data about me.

dathinab• 5 years ago

If you don't know anything about VPN's and are unlikely to (have time, motivation to) do a lot of research then you might trust Moziala/Firefox more then some unknown company-named Mullvad.

chiefalchemist• 5 years ago

Easy steady revenue is not a bad thing. Fwiw, I'm considering switching just to show some support for Mozilla.

I suspect that if they get enough traction they'll roll their own. Until then reselling was a quick and simple way to get going.

hendersoon3• 5 years ago

It's slightly cheaper than Mullvad, in the US. €5 is $5.88, and Mozilla is available for $5.00/month.

jdewitt• 5 years ago

I can't find a single reason why Mozilla should be wasting resources on VPN when there are already plenty of companies on that grind.

I can't find any good reason for encouraging people to circumvent network controls, or throw more networking complexity into what was previously very simple for users.

The constant marketing of 'you need a vpn' is super counter productive for users because they have no idea what it even is, what it can break, or why they needed it in the first place. I've run into plenty of folks that said they use vpn because someone offered it to them for free, not because they needed it for any reason.

It's stupid shit like this that makes the development of their key software languish.

IgorPartola4• 5 years ago

I didn’t need a VPN until I did:

Recently visited family in a different state and stayed with them for a week. They had a fast internet connection but something in their router made establishing a new TCP connection take forever. I bought a subscription to Mozilla VPN and viola, now my TCP connections open quickly again. Also bonus: I don’t pollute their ad results with my searches.

While yes I could dig into their router problem, they had no issues with how things worked and I needed to get work done.

hexis• 5 years ago

Why would anyone trust Mozilla with their private browsing data? https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2021/01/08/we-need-more-than-d...

kaba02• 5 years ago

Supporting the transparency of politics has nothing to do with user privacy. Mozilla has an excellent track record on the latter and they put up a great fight in a seemingly lost battle.

pmurt7• 5 years ago

I switched to Brave, I feel it's the new Firefox really (both Brave and Firefox were founded by Brendan Eich). IPFS, Tor, built-in ad blocker in Rust, crypto, that's what I want in my browser. VPN is so 2010.

approxim8ion• 5 years ago

VPN is so 2010

https://brave.com/firewall-vpn/

gregjw• 5 years ago

I honestly just thought this was a reskin on top of Mullvad

f6v2• 5 years ago

From their website:

No logging of your network activity

Does it mean I can torrent whatever I want? I mean, if there's a copyright notice, how're they going to know it was me?

notRobot• 5 years ago

Does it mean I can torrent whatever I want?

Yes

edm0nd2• 5 years ago

Just use a private tracker site. Copyright and DMCA notices are a thing of the past if you are using private torrent groups and trackers.

f6v2• 5 years ago

I was just wondering how they'll respond to any copyright notices if they don't log network activity.

JustFinishedBSG• 5 years ago

Can someone explains what's the point of "VPNs" (VPT in reality, there's no network here, just a tunnel) ?

I see the point of having a VPN to my own network but paying for a tunnel to some random place.... why ?

ajsfoux234• 5 years ago

A few use-cases I can think of: GeoIP spoofing (watching streaming shows not available in your country), bypassing IP bans from places, preventing DMCA letters from torrenting, and getting past restrictive firewalls that block websites

Aaronmacaron• 5 years ago

Here's a few reasons:

- You trust the VPN provider more than your ISP

- You want to circumvent geoblocking (Netflix, Sports broadcasts, etc...)

- You have to use an untrusted Wi-Fi

- You want to circumvent your government blocking certain websites/services

flurdy• 5 years ago

All I'd want from Firefox would be a browser based VPN. As in per tab or container. That I would appreciate. Mostly for GeoIP restrictions for some sites.

A VPN for the whole system I can use other providers who's main business is VPN.

terrycody• 5 years ago

When in Beta, firefox VPN is indeed a browser addon, I used it for months, really good, but they now removed the addon, and only support desktop version, I don't know why, is this a stupid idea? Why not support browser plugin?

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