Over a decade of anti-tracking work at Mozilla

https://blog.mozilla.org/en/privacy-security/mozilla-anti-tracking-milestones-timeline/

by cpeterso • 4 years ago

67 16 4 years ago

blog.mozilla.org

These are all great steps toward making the internet a less surveillable space. I'm curious if any work is being done to obfuscate credit card info in ways similar to what Firefox is doing for cell phone numbers. It would be great if individual transactions could use a unique dummy number linked to a private account.

darreninthenet• 4 years ago

Isn't that how Apple Pay works?

thedailymail2• 4 years ago

I guess I hadn't thought of it that way because I was focusing on Mozilla as an NPO, but you're right. I doubt a nonprofit would be able to pull the same feat off.

hutzlibu• 4 years ago

Since one of the last updates of firefox mobile pushed advertisement back on my home screen (without me consenting to it) I was reminded why I do not trust FF anymore.

At least it was not a "study" again, meaning intensive tracking of everything I do, which is enabled by default btw.

So it is nice, that they work on anti tracking features in general. But you have to pay for most of them, which is alright, but not in combination with pushing advertisement and tracking by default from the browser itself.

So to block all the shitty ads who want to track me, I just continue to use UBlock Origin. So as long as it works, I will continue to use FF - but not for this fake privacy orientated branding.

hotcoffeebear• 4 years ago

I don’t think not being default privacy-first is a bad thing for Firefox. Also, I don’t see any privacy related advertising on mozilla.org landing page.

wildrhythms2• 4 years ago

They are referring to the Firefox 'New Tab page' which does indeed show ads by default:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/about-new-tab-page

tristan9573• 4 years ago

You can turn the advertising off if it bothers you.

What in your opinion should Mozilla do to monetize Firefox? When they get money from Google to be the default search engine, people complain. When they add extremely subtle advertising that you can turn off, people complain.

To turn off advertising on Firefox for at least Android, Settings - Homepage - Sponsored Shortcuts.

wildrhythms2• 4 years ago

I thought it was clear "back on the home screen" was implying that they had turned the ads off, then Mozilla turned the ads back on without the user's consent.

StopHammoTime• 4 years ago

There needs to be a link between donations and turning off monetisation features.

tttttt5ts• 4 years ago

Thanks for reminder. I got a new phone and forgot to opt out of "study"

user39393822• 4 years ago

Rules for thee but not for me. Anti-tracking except Mozilla which has its browser, even will telemetry off, phoning home tons of user data in the background, especially when launching and closing FF.

It’s still the best choice but I find these defaults so upsetting because Mozilla is almost an organization I can believe in, in a world where that’s sadly so rare.

tristan9573• 4 years ago

What user data do you believe Mozilla to be collecting? Please be specific.

user39393822• 4 years ago

You can use mitmproxy or Charles Proxy (macOS) to profile it.

aftbit• 4 years ago

Will I actually be able to use their phone number for verification, or will it be rejected everywhere? I couldn't even use my (primary, stable, long-term) Google Voice phone number to sign up for ChatGPT because is was categorized as a VoIP number and therefore distrusted.

A primary benefit of the phone verification systems is to force bad actors to burn a costly identifier in order to create a distinct account. VoIP numbers are available quite cheaply or even free from a number of providers. Even prepaid GSM-connected cell phone numbers are sometimes distrusted (see Blizzard's Overwatch 2 phone verification scandal).

Many people also do not realize how much information is available from just a phone number from data brokers. Companies can get the associated name, billing address, and sometimes even near-real-time location data (see the 2017 scandal over Verizon and AT&T selling this).

Over a decade of anti-tracking work at Mozilla

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