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Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

janbambas.cz

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Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#241

Post by bzbarsky »

659087 wrote: post #220
bzbarsky wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tracking scripts should be blocked by default, not just delayed. There is in fact a preference to do that: Settings -> Privacy -> Tracking Protection, set to always. It breaks some reasonably popular sites, which is why it's not on by default across the board right now.

Yes, there's an option to enable blocking. I think it should be the other way around, which was kind of my whole point. That's the only way to encourage site owners to stop designing sites that break when they can't spy on users.

If the tracking protection thing were being created before the sites, I agree.

As things stand, it's a hard sell to have a browser do something that breaks sites that used to work. Most users tend to not be happy about it. This is definitely an area worth pushing on; the question is how best to do it.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#242

Post by cookiecaper »

bigbugbag wrote: post #237
cookiecaper wrote: post #21

This is the ground on which the war against Google, Facebook, et al is fought, but open-source solutions like Firefox are going to need to find a better way to monetize if they want to win. All this does is firm up the resolve of user identity resellers like FB and Google to see that Firefox gets destroyed, and it demonstrates why tech eventually all boils down to platform control. With Facebook code intruding into e…

> Mozilla is in its familiar position as the David of noble, non-moneyed interests challenging the user-hostile Goliath. Mozilla is in its familiar position of only existing because Goliath gives back a small fraction of its tracking/advertising earnings in exchange for sending users its way. The exact opposite on non-moneyed interests. Do you remember how Apple considered using mozilla code to buld their browser but…

> Mozilla is in its familiar position of only existing because Goliath gives back a small fraction of its tracking/advertising earnings in exchange for sending users its way. The exact opposite on non-moneyed interests.

I respect this position and admit that it's relevant. However, under this hypothetical, they may not need such sponsorship anymore, and they're clearly currently taking actions that will help protect users from it.

IMO this is only a serious issue if you believe that Mozilla's survival is predicated upon the continued flow of search sponsorship dollars. While their budgets may change and they may come out the end looking much different, I don't think that Mozilla or a spiritual successor serving substantially the same purpose (like OpenSolaris -> illumos) will cease to exist, no matter what Google et al do to them.

>What's to gain for microsoft by switching to firefox ?

Apple and Microsoft's interest would be defensive, blocking Google's dominance over the browser platform. They'd be interested in this because Google is currently a serious threat to both companies' major lines of business.

At present, with a fragmented competitive landscape, it's unlikely anyone will be able to stand up to Chrome. And however good or bad we believe Google or Chrome are, it's never good to lack a peer that can keep the company accountable (that is, monopolies are bad).

> Chance are this is not happening either.

I agree completely, I don't think this is a likely scenario. I just think it's an interesting and positive one.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#243

Post by j_s »

bigbugbag wrote: post #229
j_s wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For me, using Firefox is the personal conscious choice you refer to. Firefox marketing is effective but to be clear they have begun changing direction, pursuing a more practical "attracting the masses" approach (a la Signal) rather than paranoid/hyper-vigilant/engineer-style idealism (something some misinterpret Firefox marketing as still claiming), and as a result Firefox has been forced to course-correct several…

I would not be surprised if the move to opt-out spying is consequences of the dropping ALSA and adding a hard dependency to pulseaudio fiasco. Telemetry has been held as one of the main justification for the change as it supposedly showed only a fraction of users used ALSA. It turned out to be a combination of misinterpretation of collected data (installed libpulse does not mean not using ALSA) and a complete ignoran…

When I said course-correct I didn't mean complete reversal, it's usually been just enough to satiate temporary outrage in early-adopter/tech circles before it goes mainstream.

Thanks for taking the time to document the details of this particular situation which I've never heard about before. I wonder how many other mildly upsetting (?? - per "nonplussed at best") decisions are currently accumulating under the radar. Each time another pops up I'm amazed at how much Mozilla has successfully swept under the rug.

The two I knew of are including Paper by default for some time (after taking heat for this, then acquiring it a year later... though I didn't see it when I just checked) and sticking with opt-_out_ for Google Analytics on the add-ins page. After digging recently thanks to the Mr. Robot stuff I discovered the opt-out Cliqz add-on for Germany and now your anecdote.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#244

Post by j_s »

codezero wrote: post #68

I work for an analytics company, this will affect my snippet – I don't think it is a big deal, but I'm going to benchmark it on a few sites. From what is described here, it may actually help us. When folks throw tons of tags into their site, we're all competing against each-other as well as the site's own loading – it makes sense to prioritize the site's rendering. I think of this as no more invasive than pre-caching…

I appreciate your willingness to share your perspective here. The problem is that marketing/PR is a profession dedicated to finding whatever just-barely-technically-true weasel wording is required to make what they're getting paid for sound at least "ok" and preferrably "great!"

If you have time (definitely not expected) I would like to hear more specifics regarding this aspect of your statement:

> We don't do cross-domain tracking, or aggregate behavioral information across customers

vs. https://heapanalytics.com/terms

> We may also use data in an aggregated form for our own purposes

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#245

Post by brokensegue »

bigbugbag wrote: post #231
brokensegue wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

network neutrality refers to network providers being neutral to the data they transmit. applications running over the network can do as they please. by this argument ad-blockers violate net-neutrality.

Only if ad-blocker are set up by a third party such as your ISP. Anything run by the end user for her own use is not net neutrality.

yes that is my point

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#246

Post by codezero »

j_s wrote: post #244
codezero wrote: post #68

I work for an analytics company, this will affect my snippet – I don't think it is a big deal, but I'm going to benchmark it on a few sites. From what is described here, it may actually help us. When folks throw tons of tags into their site, we're all competing against each-other as well as the site's own loading – it makes sense to prioritize the site's rendering. I think of this as no more invasive than pre-caching…

I appreciate your willingness to share your perspective here. The problem is that marketing/PR is a profession dedicated to finding whatever just-barely-technically-true weasel wording is required to make what they're getting paid for sound at least "ok" and preferrably "great!" If you have time (definitely not expected) I would like to hear more specifics regarding this aspect of your statement: > We don't do cross-…

Yeah, very good point, we should clarify what we mean by "for our own purposes."

What that means right now is that we use this data to improve query performance, and for internal monitoring. We do not use that data for commercial purposes, outside of the fact that we are ourselves a business.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#247

Post by brokensegue »

jermaustin1 wrote: post #199
brokensegue wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the browsers requests are your requests

But are they? You have no real control on what the browser does when you say GO. Sure you can change browsers, and thats cool, but most consumers don't know who/what/when/where/how to change to another browser. Its a bit naive, because we technical people can switch willy-nilly from one browser to the next, to assume everyone can.

> but most consumers don't know who/what/when/where/how to change to another browser.

I don't think that's true.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#248

Post by ta12348765 »

bigbugbag wrote: post #223
sundarurfriend wrote: post #218

> To conclude on how useful the tailing feature is – unfortunately, at the moment I don’t have enough data to provide (it’s on its way, though.) I wonder if this post was rushed to publication, to manage Mozilla's public image and reestablish it as a friend to user privacy, after the 'Looking Glass' fiasco a few days ago. (I'm not exactly opposed to such PR efforts, as long as they're accompanied by actual internal c…

Much of mozilla communication is PR and marketing. Maybe this is damage control, but somehow I think they are not well organized enough to have this kind of thing happen. Besides how is this helping with privacy ? Trackers are still loaded and tracking.

"By Deeds, Not Words", Mozilla. They've had a few too many strikes lately. Their actions seem particularly greedy and tone-deaf given their supporters, and no longer aligned with what I want out of a company. Despite their constant words and apologies, they keep pulling this stuff; as a 10+ year user of Firefox I'm pulling the plug on it, just can't be trusted any longer.

Silently installing a plugin and doing an end-run around any policies in place etc. is just clown-school level.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#249

Post by yjftsjthsd-h »

mehrdadn wrote: post #114
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that it's to intentionally discourage trying to keep things out of tree, where they will inevitably break in worse ways. It also makes the GPL enthusiasts happy, but I doubt that was Linus's big goal.

I see, thanks. I'd be curious as to why he feels it would "inevitably break in worse ways", seeing as how that's not really the case on other platforms.

Basically, if you're going to have drivers out of tree, the driver ABI has to be perfectly stable, which restricts internal refactoring. Otherwise things break - and this does happen elsewhere; lots of drivers for Windows XP don't work on 10.

Re: Firefox 57 delays requests to tracking domains

#250

Post by ucaetano »

brokensegue wrote: post #245
bigbugbag wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if ad-blocker are set up by a third party such as your ISP. Anything run by the end user for her own use is not net neutrality.

yes that is my point

Does Google count as a 3rd party? It is launching a default-on ad-blocking service on Chrome.
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