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Fear of Porn URL Exposure Discourages Firefox 3 Upgrade

Posted by timothy on from the porn-mode-incomplete-until-it's-a-separate-browser dept.

Barence writes "Mozilla's Security team has disclosed a very interesting piece of research which suggests people refused to upgrade to Firefox 3 because they were afraid the browser would expose their porn collection. Mozilla's research found that the number one reason for not upgrading was the new location bar, and the fact that it delved into people's bookmark collections to suggest sites as they typed. 'When we expanded the capabilities of the location bar to search against all history and bookmarks in Firefox 3, a lot of people contacted us to say that they had certain bookmarks they didn't really want to have displayed,' Firefox's principal designer, Alex Faaborg, tactfully explains. 'In some cases users had intentionally hidden these bookmarks in deep hierarchies of folders, somewhat similar to how one might hide a physical object.'"

33 of 673 comments (clear)

  1. Browse safely by 0racle · · Score: 5, Funny

    That's why I use IE.

    --
    "I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
    1. Re:Browse safely by CarpetShark · · Score: 4, Funny

      Ahh, but you won't be using IE for much longer. Now, Mozilla have finally put the last nail in IE's coffin. Now, you MUST upgrade to Firefox 3, or be branded a pervert.

    2. Re:Browse safely by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Ahh, but you won't be using IE for much longer. Now, Mozilla have finally put the last nail in IE's coffin. Now, you MUST upgrade to Firefox 3, and be branded a pervert.

      Fixed that for you.

    3. Re:Browse safely by commodore64_love · · Score: 3, Funny

      But I *am* a pervert. I have many, many children to prove it. And wives (shhh).

      .

      But seriously - The reason I didn't upgrade to Firefox 3 is because I'm too lazy to wait 30 minutes for the download and install. So I just keep clicking cancel. It's the same reason why I still use Azureus 2 instead of the latest setup, although I did *finally* install Utorrent last night. I think I'll switchover to that now.

      BTW does anyone know why Windows 3 won't talk to my new USB flash drive? Perhaps I need new drivers.

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    4. Re:Browse safely by AlphaBit · · Score: 5, Funny

      That's why I use IE.

      "I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are"

      Your ability to combine those two statements into a single post makes you one of the most irresistable trolls I've seen...

    5. Re:Browse safely by commodore64_love · · Score: 5, Funny

      If two Anonymous Cowards speak to one another, does anyone hear them?

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    6. Re:Browse safely by Sleepy · · Score: 2, Funny

      Yes, with IE you get TONS of porn in the form of pop-ups... even when you're offline.
      Great idea.

    7. Re:Browse safely by Viperlin · · Score: 2, Funny

      30 mins for 9MB..... I guess you were too lazy to ever upgrade from that dialup thing as well... hahaha

  2. To be more specific by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm guessing "they were afraid the browser would expose their porn collection" at work.

    --
    #DeleteChrome
    1. Re:To be more specific by Tetsujin · · Score: 3, Funny

      Maybe you don't want your wife and kids to have porn urls popping up on the browser

      Maybe if you're married & have children you shouldn't be looking at porn, then you wouldn't have that problem...

      Fortunately the male sex drive ceases immediately after marriage begins, so this should be an entirely sensible solution...

      --
      Bow-ties are cool.
    2. Re:To be more specific by MightyYar · · Score: 4, Funny

      Maybe if you're married & have children you shouldn't be looking at porn, then you wouldn't have that problem...

      I don't hide my porn browsing from my wife, but I still don't want it popping up every time someone starts to type something into the address bar. I always cringe when a guest comes over and types "a" into the address bar and "Amateur Porn Blog" comes up as the first item in the list.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    3. Re:To be more specific by interkin3tic · · Score: 4, Funny

      It's not an either/or. You can do both. For more fun, you can do both at the same time

      Carefull: you can propose to do both at the same time and end up doing neither. ... I probably shouldn't have suggested the paper bag

    4. Re:To be more specific by Svippy · · Score: 2, Funny

      I'm guessing "they were afraid the browser would expose their porn collection" in bed.

      Fixed it for you.

      --
      Clicked pie.
    5. Re:To be more specific by Flea+of+Pain · · Score: 2, Funny

      I think that mental image just gave me an old person stigma...gross.

      --
      Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.
    6. Re:To be more specific by WED+Fan · · Score: 5, Funny

      Why don't we have a mod for "I'm obviously lying, but here's my story anyway..."?

      --
      Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
    7. Re:To be more specific by mcbutterbuns · · Score: 5, Funny

      Maybe if you're married & have children you shouldn't be looking at porn, then you wouldn't have that problem...

      Wrong. Maybe you just need a wife and children who are into porn as well. Having a healthy sex drive is not a fault.

      There, fixed that for you.

    8. Re:To be more specific by geminidomino · · Score: 5, Funny

      ...not related to age but to how far a stick is up their rectum.

      Hey, if that's what they're into, who are you to judge?

    9. Re:To be more specific by Delkster · · Score: 5, Funny

      where's the porn-block extension for autocomplete?

      Or a porn-get extension with autocomplete?

    10. Re:To be more specific by Darby · · Score: 3, Funny

      I know you're joking, but browsing myspace is far less likely to result in a sexual harassment suit than farmsex.com.

      Since when can farm animals file sexual harassment suits?
      How many offices even employ farm animals who might be offended?

      I just don't think you're thinking this one all the way through ;-)

    11. Re:To be more specific by commodore64_love · · Score: 2, Funny

      >>>need a wife who is into porn as well. Having a healthy sex drive is not a fault.

      I was watching "the Doctors" yesterday and a woman called-in who said she used to get orgasms when she jogged or did jumping jacks in high school gym class! We used to have a saying about those types of coed girls - "Date 'em."

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
  3. Wait...what? There's PORN on the Internet? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Why didn't someone tell me about this sooner? I wouldn't have wasted all this time on Slashdot, Digg, and Fark.

  4. stupid kids by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    If my son ever bothered to look under folder Dads/Homework/Math he might learn a few things. :-)

  5. Re:Umm .... by Shakrai · · Score: 3, Funny

    It can't be that hard.

    That depends on the sites you go to doesn't it? If your fetishes lie with something easy to spell and remember (grannysex) then it's probably easy to memorize the urls. If they lie with something harder to spell (bukkake, yes I had to look it up) or a strange combination of fetishes (bukkaking russian granny foot sex hairy gang bangs) they might be a little bit harder to memorize ;)

    --
    I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
    We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
  6. Re:Opt out? by dzfoo · · Score: 2, Funny

    Or even better, hum, opt-out? What if I reaaaally don't want the feature?

          -dZ.

    --
    Carol vs. Ghost
    ...Can you save Christmas?
  7. Re:Umm .... by Chapter80 · · Score: 3, Funny

    memorizing the porn URLs does NOT help.

    Imagine discussing something with your boss, and saying "there's a good instructional video over on YouTube".
    Boss: "Show me"

    You key in "www.you...."

    up pops:

    http://www.youporn.com/ThreeHotChicksTakeItInTheAss
    http://www.youtube.com/

    Yeah, this is a serious issue.

  8. duhguys tag by davidwr · · Score: 2, Funny

    Too bad I can't mod tags. +1 nailedit

    --
    Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
  9. Re:Umm .... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    cheaper than a pound cake!

  10. Re:Umm .... by mdf356 · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is why I type "yout" so quickly when I want to show the family videos on YouTube. :-)

    --
    Terrorist, bomb, al Qaeda, nuclear, yellowcake, kill, assassinate. Carnivore is dead... long live Echelon.
  11. Re:Umm .... by Alzheimers · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'd suggest using tinyurl, but that might make some guys self-conscious.

  12. Re:Umm .... by mcgrew · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'd think that seeing tiny "urls" might make them feel better about themselves!

    --
    Free Martian Whores!
  13. You save your porn bookmarks? by rhinokitty · · Score: 2, Funny

    Why would you bookmark porn to begin with? I just try to remember the sites, and I delete anything I download as soon as I am...cough...done.

  14. Re:HistoryBlock by xtracto · · Score: 4, Funny

    History Block fixes this problem very nicely. It let's you setup a block list of urls that should not appear in the history.

    So if someone snoops around in your browser, they would see an addon called "HistoryBlock" which contains a list of all the sites you didn't want them to know you visit.

    Classic.

    Duh, that's the reason the extension ExtensionBlock exists. You can configure it to hide any extension you do not want other people to see (HistoryBlock, refspoof, firefusk, etc).

    --
    Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
  15. Re:HistoryBlock by clone53421 · · Score: 2, Funny

    It seems to have hidden itself.

    --
    Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.