Earlier quoted context omitted.
>I'm going to wonder why Mozilla didn't do those things. Self respect?
Is that Mozilla's mission? Self respect? I thought it was a more open web.
As if those are mutually exclusive
Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
311–320 of 321 posts
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
You feel like Firefox doesn't respect your privacy, so you use Google's phone-home software instead? Sounds kinda like "Biggest reason I refuse to use weed no matter how bad methamphetamine is" to me. Unless you're using UnGoogled Chromium and blocking requests by IP or something.
Mozilla's Firefox is the 'Google' of the FOSS world. Too big, too data (telemetry) hungry. They have even experimented with doing ads. I could go on and on. You cannot be preaching about privacy and refuse to provide a simple toggle to opt-out of all telemetry in your software. FYI I do use ungoogled chromium as my main browser.
Agreed that Mozilla is big, data hungry, and hypocritical.
That's why I use LibreWolf: it respects my privacy and autonomy, and I help fight against Google's growing web engine monopoly. I specifically don't use UnGoogled Chromium because I don't want to look like "just another Chrome user" when companies decide whether or not they should test web apps on anything besides chrome, or prioritize non-chrome bugs.
Seriously, give LibreWolf a shot. It's a very minimal fork of Firefox that just removes the Mozilla botnet parts of the browser, so it should be (relatively) easy for maintainers to keep it going for the forseeable future. You can install and update it with homebrew. And, y'know... you're not helping Google push around web developers with Manifest V3 ad-blocker killers, AMP, FLOC, etc.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#313Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even better, you can manage LibreWolf updates via homebrew on Mac, and it doesn't harass you about new versions. If you browse HN routinely, you end up seeing the Firefox updates anyway, which is a good reminder to update LibreWolf. I've been really annoyed recently by software that doesn't respect my decision to update on my own schedule, or software that doesn't even let me make that decision at all in the settings…
Why don't you want the thing that has probably the largest attack surface of any program on your computer to get patches immediately?
I already update my browser at least once a week when I update all of my homebrew packages; sometimes more. If a vulnerability shows up that's so dangerous I need to immediately patch, I'll hear about it on HN etc.
Of course it is good to keep your software up-to-date to eliminate known, patched vulnerabilities. But there are enough unknown vulnerabilities out there that you should practice good hygiene on the web anyway. Auto-updates typically happen on a 1-7 day time scale, so you're vulnerable for some time anyway.
I control when my software updates because it's running on my hardware. That I control. I do not like things auto-updating and restarting when I'm trying to use them. It is a distraction from work and a sign of software doing things against my will.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#314Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you decide to visit google, that's your problem. Visiting mozilla should be optional too. Otherwise it creates attack surface area that wasn't there before.
Okay, so in conclusion, the attack vector from analytics that people spill dozens of comments on in every Mozilla thread is not unique to Firefox but rather shared with every website on the planet.
Yes. Except in most cases people aren't sent to $website unless they request it. That Mozilla does this is an opsec failure for anyone using it.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#315Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know how anyone browses the modern web without ublock origin. I don't even go on websites on my iphone anymore because they are unusable with the banner ads, the footer ads, the autoplay videos, and trying to gleam information from 1 inch worth of text on my phone. I blow through my datacap in no time. Like why did we make these phone screens so big, just to fit more ads?
I use Firefox Focus as a content blocker on iOS. It's night and difference for how much data the average news site takes to load.
I also use Firefox Focus on Android. Latest Android versions took away the option to NOT have a default application to open files/links, so I had to pick Firefox Focus as default, even though I immediately open it in Chrome for things I want to have a session active for.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#316Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#317My small wish is that FF on Android supports an intent that opens a URL in a new private tab. That way I'd be able to selectively open pages from HN, Reddit or other apps in private tabs—by the way of Tasker or Automate. I looked a bit through FF code, and there's an intent to open an empty private tab, but not an address. Alas, with my lack of knowledge about data flow in an Android app, I'm not of much help so far.
I know it's not FF, but Bromite has this feature.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#318Earlier quoted context omitted.
Okay, so in conclusion, the attack vector from analytics that people spill dozens of comments on in every Mozilla thread is not unique to Firefox but rather shared with every website on the planet.
Yes. Except in most cases people aren't sent to $website unless they request it. That Mozilla does this is an opsec failure for anyone using it.
If any network request will result in this vulnerability, then why do you have an Internet connection at all? This isn't a Mozilla problem.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#319I have to repost it aagain: Firefox: the last remaining mostly independent, maintained and reasonably popular browser. Even if it were inferior in any aspect to other options, I'd still use it for the above mentioned reasons.
The truth is, people using Firefox just to 'stick it to the big bad corpo' is getting us nowhere. Firefox is losing not because of Chrome but because of its own incompetence or inability to keep the users happy. Firefox is losing userbase a lot faster than some other browsers are gaining it, is that Firefox users' fault or Firefox's? I use Firefox because I think the sync service it provides is great and that some of…
I use firefox because quite frankly every time i use sth else (especially chrome), i want to pull my teeth out.
i honestly have no idea what people complain about when they do. maybe i just have stockholm syndrome, i dunno.
Re: Firefox Private Browsing mode upgrade
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. Except in most cases people aren't sent to $website unless they request it. That Mozilla does this is an opsec failure for anyone using it.
If any network request will result in this vulnerability, then why do you have an Internet connection at all? This isn't a Mozilla problem.
I can decide to connect only to trusted hosts. Having an automatic connection breaks that limitation.
You ask for a real attack, but you don't seem to accept the example that you were given. I'm not sure what your point is.