Firefox 33 Integrates Cisco's OpenH264

NotInHere (3654617) writes As promised, version 33 of the Firefox browser will fetch the OpenH264 module from Cisco, which enables Firefox to decode and encode H.264 video, for both the <video> tag and WebRTC, which has a codec war on this matter. The module won't be a traditional NPAPI plugin, but a so-called Gecko Media Plugin (GMP), Mozilla's answer to the disliked Pepper API. Firefox had no cross-platform support for H.264 before. Note that only the particular copy of the implementation built and blessed by Cisco is licensed to use the h.264 patents.

Comments

Re:Trusting a binary from Cisco

[ledow]

But with access to the source code, it's easily possible to verify that the binary supplied corresponds to the source.

That's how we know that TrueCrypt has no "binary" backdoors - we just try different combinations of compiling, noting the differences, until we find the one that Cisco used. If we never find the exact combination, the differences between a "known good" compile of the original source and the final binary make the amount of code to blind-check almost negligible in comparison.

It's when people DON'T provide source that you should be suspicious, or when you can't get close to their source providing their binary.

bad for standards

[l2718]

Mozilla capitulating on the tag has serious implications for web standards. By including patent-encumbered code in the browser they take the rug from under those in the www foundation that argue for free web standards. Yes, some websites wanted to use H.264 for video encoding, but Mozilla shouldn't have abetted them.