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Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

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Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#171

Post by 5ESS »

d110af5ccf wrote: post #127
kbelder wrote: post #10

Firefox users who prefer to download the browser without the unique identifier may do so in the following two ways: Download the Firefox installer from Mozilla's HTTPS repository (formerly the FTP repository). Download Firefox from third-party download sites that host the installer, e.g., from Softonic. It's nuts and another indication Mozilla doesn't understand the reason they exist, but it's not that hard to get ar…

Use a reputable Linux distro and install from the official repos, problem solved. To date the Debian maintainers have proven more trustworthy than 99.99% of the software vendors out there. They also appear to have better security practices than most commercial shops.

It’s a shame debian flushed their reputation down the drain recently.

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#172

Post by darkfirefly »

function_seven wrote: post #89
causality0 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely. Firefox is never going to defeat Chrome in the "being Chrome" category. If it wants to exist as more than a tool for Google to avoid antitrust lawsuits, it can't keep playing that game. It has to differentiate. Privacy is not differentiation because it's invisible and HN commentators are 90% of the people who care about it. I want the sense of power back. I want the feeling that Firefox gave me a decade ag…

> Nowadays using Firefox feels more like holding a political demonstration in an empty room than using the finely-tuned instrument I once had. I can't think of better words to describe my feeling as a Firefox holdout. It's still my default browser, and the one I use for 97% of my work. Mozilla is breaking my heart with their floundering. Like a fantasy author who keeps getting mired in side quests and can never get b…

Maybe uh... not like Wikipedia does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:CANCER

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#173

Post by GekkePrutser »

systemvoltage wrote: post #76
car_analogy wrote: post #62

Suppose you want to do something anonymously. 1. Download installer from Mozilla from your home network - Mozilla now has your home IP and installer ID. 2. Transfer it via USB key to a secure, anonymous computer - one not linked to you, on a network not associated with you, such as public WiFi. 3. Install Firefox using that installer on said computer. It transmits the installer ID to Mozilla, which matches the one gi…

I can't remember exactly but Apple also does this with apps. "Downloaded from ...".

That is also annoying but two wrongs don't make a right.

Also Apple seems to just track this to show a prompt as to why they need approval for the install. And it's just stored locally in the metadata.

But yes I wish this prompt could be completely turned off. This isn't just security for the user though, they have a clear financial motive in promoting their app store as an easier option. After all the app store is a huge revenue driver for them on mobile but not on Mac.

Also Apple has done a lot worse things like checking the notarisation online every time an app was launched. They have now cut this back to once every few days since the outcry about it but still it's something you should be able to turn off IMO.

But what do you expect from a closed source OS (yes it is, only the kernel is open). And again, the fact that Apple does it too does not make Mozilla's action less questionable.

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#174

Post by abandonliberty »

car_analogy wrote: post #62

Suppose you want to do something anonymously. 1. Download installer from Mozilla from your home network - Mozilla now has your home IP and installer ID. 2. Transfer it via USB key to a secure, anonymous computer - one not linked to you, on a network not associated with you, such as public WiFi. 3. Install Firefox using that installer on said computer. It transmits the installer ID to Mozilla, which matches the one gi…

I can't believe the apologists commenting on this.

Firefox put a lot of effort into tracking download to install behavior. Maybe this is the only violation you know about. There's no reason to continue to believe in Mozilla's good faith. They've been captured, and are 90% dependent on Google revenue.

Discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28954390

Firefox is dead. It's time to move past denial. It doesn't stand for anything you think it does. I'm sad, too. Time to bury the putrid, rotting corpse.

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#175

Post by GekkePrutser »

causality0 wrote: post #48
ordu wrote: post #14

They seem to be trying to gather a lot of telemetry to measure how they can boost popularity of Firefox. I wonder did they tried to measure how the measurement itself influences popularity? Social measurements are like quantum ones, they change reality. There was a funny story of a Hawthorn Experiment[1], which tried to find ways to boost productivity but at the end managed to state just that the very attempt to cond…

Well they've spent a decade trying the "be more like Chrome" method. I suggest they try the "be more like Firefox from when Firefox was successful" method.

Yep. Trying to aim at the mainstream they've already lost, and alienating the privacy conscious power user (their last userbase) ever more...

If only they would come to their senses..

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#176

Post by abandonliberty »

zagrebian wrote: post #75
car_analogy wrote: post #62

Suppose you want to do something anonymously. 1. Download installer from Mozilla from your home network - Mozilla now has your home IP and installer ID. 2. Transfer it via USB key to a secure, anonymous computer - one not linked to you, on a network not associated with you, such as public WiFi. 3. Install Firefox using that installer on said computer. It transmits the installer ID to Mozilla, which matches the one gi…

> Mozilla now has your home IP Since when does Mozilla collect IP addresses?

Are you suggesting in good faith that Mozilla would implement and transmit a unique ID without linking you to your download session? I've never come so close to breaking hacker news etiquette.

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#177

Post by GekkePrutser »

function_seven wrote: post #89
causality0 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely. Firefox is never going to defeat Chrome in the "being Chrome" category. If it wants to exist as more than a tool for Google to avoid antitrust lawsuits, it can't keep playing that game. It has to differentiate. Privacy is not differentiation because it's invisible and HN commentators are 90% of the people who care about it. I want the sense of power back. I want the feeling that Firefox gave me a decade ag…

> Nowadays using Firefox feels more like holding a political demonstration in an empty room than using the finely-tuned instrument I once had. I can't think of better words to describe my feeling as a Firefox holdout. It's still my default browser, and the one I use for 97% of my work. Mozilla is breaking my heart with their floundering. Like a fantasy author who keeps getting mired in side quests and can never get b…

Indeed.. For me the only reason I still really use it is because the other options are even worse. I definitely won't use Chrome. And Microsoft is pushing edge so hard it annoys me (both at work politically, and by pushing it everywhere in Windows)

Also, Firefox is the only browser I know that has end to end encrypted sync. Google and Microsoft enjoy snooping around in your bookmarks (great to determine marketing interests) too much to ever offer this. You can even self host it.

Also it still has a few power user features left over like container tabs. Though they've relegated it to a plug-in now.

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#178

Post by function_seven »

darkfirefly wrote: post #172
function_seven wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nowadays using Firefox feels more like holding a political demonstration in an empty room than using the finely-tuned instrument I once had. I can't think of better words to describe my feeling as a Firefox holdout. It's still my default browser, and the one I use for 97% of my work. Mozilla is breaking my heart with their floundering. Like a fantasy author who keeps getting mired in side quests and can never get b…

Maybe uh... not like Wikipedia does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:CANCER

Hah, yeah, I've seen that page before. It's not ideal. I'd still take it over their current funding strategy of "don't piss off Google."

Or maybe I should find a better example. But one thing about Wikipedia is that it appears to be much the same as it was 10 years ago and more. Wikipedia hasn't started introducing Wiki VPN, nor has it partnered with Mr. Robot to temporarily insert marketing stuff into articles.

To the extent that Wikimedia has graft and vanity projects, they're not ruining the core "product".

So... I guess yeah, just like Wikipedia, as in "Look, even with donations you can spend a crapton of money. Maybe not $500mm a year, but still enough to support development of an open source software product."

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#179

Post by GekkePrutser »

ordu wrote: post #124
threatripper wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they just kind of forgot how to make good software and now desperately try to recreate that magic using loads of metrics and social experiments leading to loads of competing interpretations and infighting.

There are nothing wrong with laying a scientific basis under your anecdotal experience, to get an ability to reproduce your successes. But it must be done by using the best possible scientific methods and by great minds, just a statistics wouldn't do it magically. My (probably wrong) opinion, is that they hired data scientists who knows nothing about social science's research and these statisticians are trying to sub…

The benefit of having a sea of data is that it's easier to cherry pick the data points that support exactly what you want to say :)

Re: Each Firefox download has a unique identifier

#180

Post by lmm »

d110af5ccf wrote: post #127
kbelder wrote: post #10

Firefox users who prefer to download the browser without the unique identifier may do so in the following two ways: Download the Firefox installer from Mozilla's HTTPS repository (formerly the FTP repository). Download Firefox from third-party download sites that host the installer, e.g., from Softonic. It's nuts and another indication Mozilla doesn't understand the reason they exist, but it's not that hard to get ar…

Use a reputable Linux distro and install from the official repos, problem solved. To date the Debian maintainers have proven more trustworthy than 99.99% of the software vendors out there. They also appear to have better security practices than most commercial shops.

Debian has a deliberate policy of extensively modifying upstream code, including security-critical code, without any dedicated security review. This (predictably) resulted in quite possibly the worst general-purpose software security bug of all time, where SSH and TLS keys generated on Debian machines were effectively blank and supposedly encrypted communications were readable by anyone. Debian has not changed its practices to prevent a reoccurrence and continues to follow the same policy.

I agree that most Debian maintainers are trustworthy and have good intentions, but I would not consider them as having good security practices.

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