Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

blog.mozilla.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 209 posts

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#181

Post by JohnFen »

Someone1234 wrote: post #53
lprd wrote: post #25

This is great! On another note, I'm wondering when I can remove uBlock Origin?

I guess it boils down to your goal with using uBlock Origin. Are you anti-tracking or anti-ad? This blocks some ads as almost a side-effect but that isn't its goal. If ads aren't tracking, they're fully visible/working. I use this because I value my privacy, but choose not to use uBlock Origin because I understand websites I use need revenue. It is about finding your own personal balance.

I'm anti-tracking. I don't, and have never, blocked ads specifically. I do block scripts, though. The side-effect of that is that I don't see most ads, but that isn't the point.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#182

Post by greycol »

c3534l wrote: post #107
elcomet wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure those weren't just regular ads without any personalization ? This seem like the kind of ad which is very broad and could fit most men (how to talk to woman, how to get a job, ...)

Yes, because I closed my private window and reopened it to see if it made a difference. They also had regional stuff from where my vpn is located.

I'm unsure of behaviour in firefox, but at least for me chrome at work will keep session information for the private window until chrome is closed completely not just the private window.

Having said that anecdotally I'm sure google do ip/wifi network tracking as after I was connected to a friends wifi network while he was in the process of moving house I began being served ads for moving companies even though I had done no similiar searches or visited related sites.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#184

Post by gorhill »

sp332 wrote: post #108
coldpie wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The most popular of these is Easylist, which is not well-maintained I've never had a problem with a website that was solved by turning off Easylist. I also almost never see ads. So it seems high quality to me. What problems have you had?

Here's an example. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/07/i-updated-my-crusty-... Ars Technica has certain posts, clearly marked with a header and everything, that include Amazon affiliate links. Easylist has a specific list of sites, mostly tech sites, which are not allowed to use Amazon affiliate links. It's not a general ban on affiliate links, and blocking them this way simply removes the text from the middle of…

This sort of issue is usually worked around in uBO when they are reported on uBO's own filter issue tracker: " rel="nofollow">https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uAssets/issues>.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#185

Post by swebs »

daedalus_j wrote: post #110
Zenbit_UX wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is exactly what happens when you use a VPN. Only services like primevideo and Netflix bother to detect VPNs and force you to get off, 99% of the web treats you like a regular user, but with an insane diversity of interests.

That's becoming less and less true. For example, the wiki.debian.org blocks users of (at least) privateinternetaccess VPN. (You get a 403 forbidden. This doesn't happen when I use my personal VPN routed out through a VPS provider, only through PIA.) I have encountered this with various other sites as well, both outright blocks and degraded experience. Frustrating. Although I don't really trust VPN providers, I trust…

It's more likely those IPs were blocked manually due to vandalism. If you set up a VPN server on a VPS with a static IP, you shouldn't run into that problem.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#186

Post by clairity »

magduf wrote: post #123
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I avoided doing so because I don't really want the internet to know what credit cards I have. With that said, let's say I specifically name "Chase". Are you going to cancel your existing Chase bank account or credit card upon hearing this?

>With that said, let's say I specifically name "Chase". Are you going to cancel your existing Chase bank account or credit card upon hearing this? Well put it this way: if you specifically name "Chase", I'm going to think twice about applying for a credit card there or opening a bank account there. It's harder when you're already invested in a business, but when someone is shopping for a new one, when they hear credi…

yah, absolutely avoid the big 4: chase, citibank, bank of america, and wells fargo. there's always a better local/regional/online alternative at a lower cost and with (often much) better service.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#187

Post by clairity »

m463 wrote: post #183
sunasra wrote: post #14

I love the way Firefox is putting their efforts towards the privacy. Each releases increases my trust on them. Kudos to the team

They report a lot of data by default back to mozilla though.

yah, i'd love to have a list of sites and what's being sent. for example, a new one that popped up recently: private-network.firefox.com

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#188

Post by StavrosK »

AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #21

The downside of all of this is that I feel like sites are now intentionally being designed to break if this kind of stuff is blocked. I used to be able to use Firefox Focus (which has tracking protection built-in) to pay most of my bills. This was convenient because I would just open up the one site in FFF, pay the bill, and then close it, with all browsing history automatically deleted. In the past month about 3 of…

Well, rejoice. Now that the set of people for whom this breaks got expanded from "you" to "20% of everybody", they will likely fix the problem.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#189

Post by brynjolf »

robbya wrote: post #56
PavlovsCat wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate what page you mean? I see nothing in the source of https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search/?q=blah or about:addons

I believe they are talking about an outdated issue: https://github.com/mozilla/addons-frontend/issues/2785#issue...

It is not outdated since it requires you to enable Do not track which makes you a target for tracking. It is bad design and they know it. They don't even respect their own disable analytics toggle.

Re: Latest Firefox Brings Privacy Protections Front and Center

#190

Post by ninjin »

joaobeno wrote: post #166
floatboth wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That particular example is just extremely odd because… well, the business model of the utilities whose bills you pay (nor the bank's) shouldn't be based on advertising?? Maybe it's just a pile of web development fail, using 3rd party cookies for no good reason..

Here is why they track and collect: “Hiding within those mounds of data is knowledge that could change the life of a patient, or change the world.” (Atul Butte, Stanford) "Information is the oil of the 21st century, and analytics is the combustion engine” (Peter Sondergaard, Senior Vice President, Gartner) “Without big data analytics, companies are blind and deaf, wandering out onto the web like deer on a freeway.” (…

Right, but regardless of the factuality of these claims, remind me how we continue to sidestep the issue of consent from those that are tracked? “Privacy nuts” such as myself do not struggle to see upsides to say a global DNA database with perfect coverage, it is the fact that we are very much aware of the terrible potential downsides of a world where privacy and consent is largely ignored that makes us concerned.
Post reply on HN