firefox literally just rugpulled everyone by officially selling people's data starting last week.

So disable data sharing. The alternative is selling your data without saying a thing.

The controversy was misinformation, and the parent post wasn't even what the controversy was. People thought FF had been doing it before. The reality is, as I understand, they just updated their terms to cover all possible legal issues - including that some things you command Firefox to do involves using your data.

> including that some things you command Firefox to do involves using your data.

Mozilla has never used the data you upload/send via Firefox to non-Mozilla websites (as it should be), and they shouldn't have that permission just as Epson the company shouldn't have the right to use for any purpose a paper marked as classified just because some fed employee sent a digital copy of it to an Epson printer.

And they don’t have that permission. Why is everyone skipping over the part of the sentence that specifies that this is only “for the purpose of doing as you request”. As you request! This is night and day to any other TOS I’ve ever read.

Seriously. Imagine the despair at Mozilla as no matter what they do, people they help and who support FOSS and privacy, tear them apart - seemingly out of habit, or like it's the cool thing to do.

You say this like there are not ample valid reasons to criticize Mozilla.

I don't believe there are. The fact that so many pile on is evidence they are wrong - Internet mobs are a strong signal of unreliability.

You don't believe there are any valid reasons to criticize Mozilla?

What do you get out of this, bringing down Mozilla and arguing senselessly on the Internet?

I think healthy criticism is ultimately beneficial, whereas blind denial is not.

"for the purpose of doing as you request" is still permission for using my own content, no matter how limited the scope they want to make it look like. It's not Mozilla Corp itself that is processing my inputs behind the scenes when I upload my photos to Imgur, is it? It's my own locally installed copy of Firefox.

They don't have that permission.

Except for the specific cases where their Privacy Notice does give them permission to collect and sell user information, such as collecting information about what topics users are making search queries about.

> such as collecting information about what topics users are making search queries about.

Just read the terms rather than spread misinformation. That data doesn't leave the user's computer.

Do you just not care what happens to Mozilla? How does it help to spread misinformation about them?

Excerpts from the Privacy Notice that I have read, and attempted to get you to read:

> Mozilla processes certain technical and interaction data, such as how many searches you perform, how many sponsored suggestions you see and whether you interact with them. Mozilla's partners receive de-identified information about interactions with the suggestions they've served.

> Depending on your location, Mozilla derives the high level category (e.g., travel, shopping) of your search from keywords in that query, in order to understand the types and number of searches being made.

> Mozilla may also receive location-related keywords from your search (such as when you search for “Boston”) and share this with our partners to provide recommended and sponsored content.

Your claim "That data doesn't leave the user's computer" is simply not true. Mozilla isn't selling empty files to their advertising partners. The only true and valid defense you've put up for Mozilla in the past week is that they're trying to anonymize the data before they sell it, but that's not nearly as strong an argument as you seem to think it is.

Nothing personal or valuable leaves your computer. Maybe the location queries, but I expect they are anonymized.

You are focused on some concept of perfect confidentiality, which is not how real engineering or confidentiality works.

I'm not interested in your personal comments. Keep them to yourself.

> Nothing personal or valuable leaves your computer. Maybe the location queries, but I expect they are anonymized.

You said "That data doesn't leave the user's computer". It does. You may not consider it personal or valuable and may trust Mozilla's anonymization to be sufficient, but well-written privacy laws rightly do not grant Mozilla (or anyone less trustworthy than Mozilla) that kind of wiggle room.

See my reply to the other comment. They still have permission, and it doesn't matter how limited they try to scope it. It should be none because they have no business having a license over my own content I upload to non-Mozilla websites: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43263232

Where can I buy the data? Or who are they selling it to?

This is high and mighty, but didn’t they fire security team a year or so ago (couldn’t afford pay for higher ups)? I like how everyone just memory-holed that part and moved on… why would you recommend that to anyone?