That's FUD
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/firefox/
Review process: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/Data_Collection and not only is the source available, you can inspect opt-in metrics in about:telemetry, and see aggregated metrics at telemetry.mozilla.org (no other vendor will share that with you)
> There ought to be a full transparency report on every browser...
Yes, but not all browser vendors care about your privacy. So if privacy matters to you use Firefox :)
https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/16/16784628/mozilla-mr-robo...
And I do use Firefox.
But they really should not have done that, even if in the end the actual harm done was nil it broke trust.
There is also this:
https://github.com/amq/firefox-debloat
I actually take exception to your classifying my comment as FUD, I'm in nobody's pocket (pun intended) and the worst you could accuse me of is being wrong. That said I was happy to trust the Mozilla of the past a lot more than I'm willing to trust the Mozilla of the present. Their forced upgrade strategy breaking my workflow and the Mr. Robot episode on top of that did little to assure me that they still have my best interest in mind. The thing that keeps me from switching is that I'm pretty sure all the competition is much worse.
jaquesm is merely pointing out that "use Firefox" needs a disclaimer today, whereas in the past one could simply use Firefox out of the box.
But that's beside the point, jaquesm said he expected browser vendors to clearly state what information they collect, I think Mozilla does a pretty comprehensive job at that:
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/firefox/
And equating all data collection with spyware does NOT help win the battle. We're all on the same side here, but blowing things out of proportions doesn't serve the goal. It makes people give up.
It's fair to disagree with some decisions, and you don't have to opt-in for telemetry, but calling it spyware is unfair. It fair for you to say that you don't think it's necessary for your browser to collect performance metrics, and it's fair for you to not opt-in.
Equating things you dislike or find unnecessary with spyware is very dangerous. It gives other people the idea that browser choice doesn't matter. That privacy is impossible.
Note: we see extremism and exaggeration like this many places (politics included), and we have to be the ones holding each other to be reasonable. Otherwise, the opposition will frame us all as fanatics :)
>Through reverse engineering, we have documented the encryption protocols used by QQ Browser to protect the trove of sensitive information each client uploads to QQ Browser’s servers (this is summarized in Section 2). This sensitive information includes International Mobile Equipment Identifier (IMEI) numbers, web pages vis- ited, locational data, and many other kinds of private data about a QQ Browser user. The possibility that Tencent shares this information with state actors is explored in existing reports [15], and QQ Browser’s data collection mirrors competing browsers such as UC Browser [12] and Baidu Browser [14].