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Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#121

Post by shurcooL »

fiatjaf wrote: post #111

> For example, if you need to jump on the internet to look up Muddy Waters’ real name Best idea ever. That's the most common use case people have and one that's drastically underserved by current browsers. If people can't get their browser to quickly open a link to simple stuff, it means the web is failing. If the web is failing they'll quickly jump over to sending images over WhatsApp or fall into the trap of using…

    For example, if you need to jump on the internet to look
    up Muddy Waters’ real name, and instead of “McKinley
    Morganfield” you get pop-up ads, screen takeovers,
    “sponsored” content and other third-party advertising-
    driven distraction, then you know what browser overkill
    feels like.
What? I don't understand how that's possible. If you just google search for Muddy Waters, it tells you his real name right on the search results screen. Even if it didn't, his Wikipedia page is one of the first results, and it doesn't have any pop-up ads, screen takeovers, etc.

Am I missing something, or can someone explain what they're referring to?

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#122

Post by chairmanwow »

progval wrote: post #7

According to F-Droid [1], it contains `com.google.android.gms:play-services-analytics`. [1]: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/rfp/issues/171#note_30410376

I think I'm only surprised to see this comment and not that Firefox bundled analytics into their app. What's controversial about anonymized usage statistics in 2017?

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#123

Post by agumonkey »

tksb wrote: post #60
mch82 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Made me laugh to see that Gruber's term is catching on

Same. Used dickbar in conversation recently to almost pure silence. Very apt.

to see or not to see https://twitter.com/search?q=%23dickbar

that is the question

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#124

Post by aw3c2 »

chairmanwow wrote: post #122
progval wrote: post #7

According to F-Droid [1], it contains `com.google.android.gms:play-services-analytics`. [1]: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/rfp/issues/171#note_30410376

I think I'm only surprised to see this comment and not that Firefox bundled analytics into their app. What's controversial about anonymized usage statistics in 2017?

Just because everyone is doing it does not mean it is ethical and ok. There is nothing anonymized about sending info about my browsing behaviour to one of the world's biggest corporations that monitors vast amounts of the internet. Mozilla should be doing the good thing, not feed a data kraken.

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#125

Post by bigbugbag »

jancsika wrote: post #112
pgeorgi wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on what it's tracking. There's a huge difference between "On average Focus was started 30 times a day by any single user" (which can inform resource allocation decisions for that project) and "bigbugbag was reading hacker news for 4 hours on Tuesday" (uhm. no.) They should be more transparent and upfront what they're collecting and why though.

> They should be more transparent and upfront what they're collecting and why though. ... on their flagship browser . On their super-private, pinky-swear no tracking we-hate-ads-but-sure-do-love-you tiny browser, there should be... no tracking.

I disagree with you. This should apply to their flagship browser too. Have you read the marketing crap they push about desktop firefox ?

The 100% fresh, free-range, ethical browser

More privacy

Firefox doesn’t sell access to your personal information like other companies. From privacy tools to tracking protection, you’re in charge of who sees what.

More freedom

Following the pack isn’t our style. As part of the non-profit Mozilla, Firefox leads the fight to protect your online rights and champion an Internet that benefits everyone — not just a few.

Then you click the privacy policy and you're welcomed with:

Things you should know

Firefox automatically connects to us and our service providers to provide updates, security, Snippets, Firefox Health Report, and other features.

They also have a very loose definition of personal information: 'For us, "personal information" means information which identifies you, like your name or email address.' In times when we know a handful of cross-referenced metadata is enough to identify someone with a high level of success this is unacceptable from some entity who claims to champion privacy, online rights and user freedom. It only shows that either there are highly incompetent people in charge at mozilla or that they treat their users as too dumb to notice.

IMHO there should no tracking by default on firefox desktop and opt-in for those who want to. Actually I'd even go further and say that no browser should include tracking and should block all trackers, analytics, commercial advertising and other PR words for surveillance, spying and profiling.

With relatively few efforts this was something one could almost achieve, at least get closer to, through extensions in firefox. Mozilla put an end to it by dropping their extension engine.

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#126

Post by drdaeman »

chairmanwow wrote: post #122
progval wrote: post #7

According to F-Droid [1], it contains `com.google.android.gms:play-services-analytics`. [1]: https://gitlab.com/fdroid/rfp/issues/171#note_30410376

I think I'm only surprised to see this comment and not that Firefox bundled analytics into their app. What's controversial about anonymized usage statistics in 2017?

Well, about the very same moment you see "Browse like no one's watching / Automatically block online tracking while you browse" app starts to silently send some data to app.adjust.com and incoming.telemetry.mozilla.org.

If that's not controversial, that's at least ironic.

(Just to clarify: this particular behavior was observed on a version from a Play Store, not FDroid. And this was about 1.5 months ago or so. But I doubt things had fundamentally changed since then.)

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#127

Post by prophesi »

shurcooL wrote: post #121
fiatjaf wrote: post #111

> For example, if you need to jump on the internet to look up Muddy Waters’ real name Best idea ever. That's the most common use case people have and one that's drastically underserved by current browsers. If people can't get their browser to quickly open a link to simple stuff, it means the web is failing. If the web is failing they'll quickly jump over to sending images over WhatsApp or fall into the trap of using…

For example, if you need to jump on the internet to look up Muddy Waters’ real name, and instead of “McKinley Morganfield” you get pop-up ads, screen takeovers, “sponsored” content and other third-party advertising- driven distraction, then you know what browser overkill feels like. What? I don't understand how that's possible. If you just google search for Muddy Waters, it tells you his real name right on the search…

Sure, but then you're depending on Google search. And hoping that the information they bring to the top is actually correct. When you actually have to peruse the search list and click on a site, that's when the trouble begins.

When I'm asked to look something up on my LG G2 budget phone, I usually just say "Can't, sorry" or "Sure, give me a few minutes".

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#128

Post by JadeNB »

bigbugbag wrote: post #106
fourthark wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this FUD or serious? Because they are certainly claiming to be the opposite of that these days.

This is simply history. The proprietary module (now long removed) is among the reasons the iceweasel project was born (not the debian one but the GNU one that has been renamed icecat when debian took over the iceweasel name). It is a known fact that for years 90% or more of mozilla money came from google in exchange for making its search engine the default including tracking through an additional parameter in the URL…

> The proprietary module (now long removed) is among the reasons the iceweasel project was born (not the debian one but the GNU one that has been renamed icecat when debian took over the iceweasel name).

Do you have a reference for this? The Wiki page, and the project application, seem just to refer to a desire to avoid non-free plug-ins:

> ALL GNUzilla Programs will basically BE Mozilla Source Builds, with the major exception being the implementation of NO proprietary softwares, including plug-ins, according and adhereing to the GPL.

(http://savannah.gnu.org/task/?4529). That's certainly not inconsistent with what you said, but it seems a stretch to deduce what you said without some other reference.

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#129

Post by tylersmith »

fourthark wrote: post #86
bigbugbag wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, but Mozilla has a quite a record for using firefox for surveillance and spying purpose, the early versions of firefox had a proprietary modules just for this purpose and the recent version have 'telemetry'. AFAIK f-droid always had a warning about firefox containing and promoting non free in addition of tracking users from https://f-droid.org/wiki/page/org.mozilla.firefox : This app has the NonFreeAdd Antifeat…

Is this FUD or serious? Because they are certainly claiming to be the opposite of that these days.

Mozilla have used various telemetry tools over time to assist with product development. It's possible they're trying to covertly track users but unlikely. It should certainly be known and public but does not necessarily equate to spying.

Re: Firefox Focus – A new private browser for iOS and Android

#130

Post by st3fan »

kuschku wrote: post #105
fourthark wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this FUD or serious? Because they are certainly claiming to be the opposite of that these days.

They just recently had a PR disaster because Firefox included Google Analytics in the Addon menu. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14753546

I don’t think that was a “pr disaster” - vocal minority is loud but not that loud.
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