She didn't think there would be anyone in the middle! She expected the app to access the URL, and it did, but she didn't expect it to also send a copy to its creators. Like, what if you discovered that each time you send an email, Thunderbird also sends the email address you were writing to to a server owned by Mozilla?
Re:Leaking URLs to the Clown
by magicalhippo on Monday June 24, 2024 @11:14PM
(#40784039)
> Like, what if you discovered that each time you send an email, Thunderbird also sends the email address you were writing to to a server owned by Mozilla?
Then I wouldn't be surprised.
I haven't read Thunderbirds privacy policy in detail, so for all I know there's a clause about collecting email addresses in there. Could even be for a good reason, spam filtering for example.
And as mentioned I take that into account when writing emails. I do indeed avoid writing certain stuff and avoid sending certain mails due to privacy. For the rest I see it as an acceptable risk/reward tradeoff.
I'm not a tinfoil hat kinda guy, but the innocence is gone when it comes to modern software.
Then you have to decide for yourself if you're OK with that or not.
I know Microsoft looks at my files when I put them on my OneDrive. I take that into account when I decide what to put there. I know Google reads my mail when Thunderbird sends it through their SMTP servers. I know it'll be read by some unknown parties along the way to the recipient. I take that into account when I write my mail.
If I pasted a URL into a feed reader, I'd most certainly assume the app, and by extension its creators, would access that URL and read what's there. I'd take that into account when using the app.