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Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

mstdn.social

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Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#121

Post by stranded22 »

zihotki wrote: post #75
stranded22 wrote: post #35

I was about to clear it - but, you know what, it IS needed. Website publishers need to know what works and what doesn’t - otherwise they cannot improve nor generate revenue. So, privacy preserving measuring? I’m in, well done Mozilla.

It is needed for advertisement business, for Mozilla corp. (which is an ads business too https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-anonym-raising-t... ), not for Firefox users. Mozilla has enough money to run Firefox for a decade without accepting any additional money if they stop spending money left and right on non-relevant things.

Yeah, fair point. Sometimes, I’m a .

Off it goes!

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#122

Post by ErigmolCt »

prime17569 wrote: post #11

FYI Safari has been doing this (also enabled by default) for years on all Apple platforms. To disable it on macOS: Safari > Preferences/Settings > Advanced > Uncheck "Allow privacy-preserving measurement of ad effectiveness" To disable it on iOS: Settings > Safari > Advanced (scroll all the way down) > Turn off "Privacy Preserving Ad Measurement"

Thank you for sharing this information

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#123

Post by shortrounddev2 »

mrweasel wrote: post #91
account42 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except this is not how things work. All you are doing is giving the advertisers another tool to track you, it won't magically make them stop using all the other ones.

I was thinking that they'd be forced to adopt this, as 3rd. party cookies goes away, but somehow I sense it's more likely that advertisers would adopt something like device fingerprinting instead. The online shopping businesses really isn't interested in privacy, I don't even really blame the adtech industry for this one. The companies running the ads and retargetting campaigns want to know who clicked on what and wh…

Device fingerprinting is a hack and unreliable in the long run. Third party cookies are being replaced with first party cookies and PII-based tracking methods like UID2, which enables a decentralized network of vendors to generate the same hash for the same email address across nodes, giving advertisers a global understanding of identity. Once third party cookies are gone, expect to see login prompts everywhere

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#124

Post by worble »

no_way wrote: post #88
account42 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The scare quotes here are uncalled for: it is privacy-preserving. It is strictly less privacy-preserving than not implementing this "feature" that has zero benefit to the user running the browser. At the very least it pings yet another third party, most likely it effectively leaks much more. > The best objection to these proposals isn't privacy, it's that a browser vendor is lifting a finger for advertisers. I gues…

Web needs to make money. Giving tools to advertisers while making sure user privacy is preserved is better than free reign of tracking we have before, no? I myself do not like ads or tracking, but we need to be realistic and there needs a way to make web sustainable. How to do that and making sure that monopolies like Google are in check is a valid concern though, but in these conversations is the only point I hear.…

>Web needs to make money.

No, it doesn't. I have no issue with it making money, but that was neither the original purpose of the web nor is it an end goal for everyone using it.

> Giving tools to advertisers while making sure user privacy is preserved is better than free reign of tracking we have before, no?

This statement is unconnected to the first. The way people just link "web", "money" and "advertising" without even stopping to think that there might be alternatives is exactly why everything online is in such a sad state of affairs.

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#125

Post by baggachipz »

PedroBatista wrote: post #69

I've been using Firefox for more than 20 years since the Phoenix days, even when it was cleary slower than Chrome (it still is but the diferences are minimal ) I'm not acting surprised, but I think it's more than time to start looking into a viable alternative. It's "Chromium" (?) still a thing? Do you guys know if there is a browser based on Firefox that doesn't have any of the BS Mozilla is putting into their brows…

Orion, if you're on Mac: https://kagi.com/orion/

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#126

Post by pacifika »

I’ve begrudgingly kept this enabled because if this works users are a lot better off, cannot be manipulated as they are currently, and it frees up the browser makers to break all the ways people are being tracked, pointing advertiser networks to this alternative.

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#127

Post by b112 »

RobotToaster wrote: post #105
no_way wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Web needs to make money. Giving tools to advertisers while making sure user privacy is preserved is better than free reign of tracking we have before, no? I myself do not like ads or tracking, but we need to be realistic and there needs a way to make web sustainable. How to do that and making sure that monopolies like Google are in check is a valid concern though, but in these conversations is the only point I hear.…

> Web needs to make money. Commercial use of the internet was banned until 1991, it worked perfectly fine until then.

When I think back before big monetization, the web was better.

An example, look at TikTok or YouTube. 99.999% garbage, essentially clickbait farms, with zero valuable content.

Influencers? A plague. Political click bait videos? Harmful to democracy. Nutty flat earth, perpetual motion, conspiracy videos? Same.

The rest of the web is the same. Affiliate links are vile, evil things. And endless pages copy pasted to steal hits.

Monetization has destroyed the internet.

I'd much prefer people setting up their own small webpages, their hobbies, etc, with no monetization incentives.

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#128

Post by ibejoeb »

doe_eyes wrote: post #30

The scare quotes here are uncalled for: it is privacy-preserving. The approach allows measurement without disclosing who, specifically, did what with the ad. The best objection to these proposals isn't privacy, it's that a browser vendor is lifting a finger for advertisers. I guess the fundamental question there is if we prefer to outright shut down online advertising, or give it the tools it needs to be less bad. Op…

>The approach allows measurement without disclosing who, specifically, did what with the ad.

Doesn't this break most modern methodologies. Can I do next best action without knowing who did what?

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#129

Post by mzajc »

pasc1878 wrote: post #103
prepend wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox is open source. I do pay for it as a tool. Toolmakers also work out of desire to practice their craft. Many projects are written, not to “earn a living.”

True but Firefox is mainly written by people who want to earn a living. Much FOSS is actually written by people who are being paid to do it, How do you fund the producers of Firefox and the infrastructure needed to get it built and released. Currently the only way is that the sellers of the adverts you read give money to fund Firefox. Now if you paid for Firefox then they don't need to get money from advertisers. Sim…

> Currently the only way is that the sellers of the adverts you read give money to fund Firefox.

According to Wikipedia[1], most of Mozilla is funded by Google, for setting them as the default search engine, rather than by more conventional advertisers.

On a more personal note, I'd prefer if that money went towards improving their FOSS offering instead of giving the now-former CEO a $7M bonus[2], acquiring advertising businesses [3][4], and littering Firefox with these anti-features.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Google

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitchell_Baker

[3]: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/mozilla-anonym-raising-t...

[4]: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/pocket/

Re: Firefox 128 enables "privacy-preserving" ad measurements by default

#130

Post by ndriscoll »

pasc1878 wrote: post #115
ndriscoll wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps they should consider accepting money from their users then? Wikipedia doesn't fund itself by spying on you and selling the data. They ask for money.

Yes although given current user behaviour and expectations I doubt they would make enough money to continue. If even a Microsoft Executive is saying that anything on the web can be freely copied then what does a normal user think.

They're a charitable nonprofit, and the Mozilla license is one of the more permissive ones; they're fine with you freely sharing their work.

They currently already get 7M/year in donations for no purpose. I imagine they'd get a lot more if that money would fund Firefox, and how many core/paid developers do they really need if they have people that know that they're doing?

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