Politicians do this all the time. Constantly. They do it because the PR firms taught them to do this, and those same PR people work for tech companies now.
(It's awful that journalists these days let politicians get away with it. When I went to journalism school, we would get a failing grade if we allowed an interview subject to dodge a question like that, but that's a rant for another day.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5ExYQ21sGY
The sad part is, that the politician asking the question does a better job that most journalists and points at the absurdity of the dodged answers.
That, or they do fun stuff like giving this splash screen on a new update:
https://imgur.com/a/p4CVBHb "Power and privacy to the people. No need to dig into your security settings. Fierce privacy is our default."
You know, the browser that defaults to Google search and having search suggestions on. I know I'd have a couple privacy settings to change.
And having opt-out telemetry with very limited messaging that it occurs.
I see that Mozilla has started pushing Pocket again. With the last upgrade, I got a new tab with a full-page Pocket ad. They don't need telemetry to discover that I've never used Pocket. I dislike their custom of using upgrades to stuff an ad in my face; and I dislike that scarce screen real-estate is used for an unnecessary button. If they've got to create a new tab on upgrade, it should show the changelist, not a "promotional message".
It's a bloody plug-in, and it should be possible to unplug it.
A1: we never review the disclosures. We have reviewed zero apps for discrepancies in the last year.
A2: since we never check (refer to A1), it can get as bad as it likes, and would you please be quiet because we’re trying to remain wilfully ignorant over here!
A3: we have taken zero enforcement actions in the last year.
A4: ARGH! WHY ARE YOU TELLING US ABOUT PROBLEMS? WE DON’T WANT TO KNOW OR WE MIGHT HAVE TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Y’know. Something.
> As we’ve noted, data sharing with “service providers” is exempt from disclosure requirements.
> Many different companies act as service providers, including Google itself
Well, whaddya know. Apps don't have to report whether they share data with Google.
I found it striking that in the list of four questions that Mozilla asked Google, not one of them elicited a straight answer. I don't mean just evasive or slippery; they failed to answer the question, instead answering a different question, one that wasn't asked.