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New Firefox Suggests Ways To Get More Out of the Web (cnet.com)
Starting Tuesday, Firefox will nudge you to try out options designed to make the web more interesting, more useful or more productive. From a report: Mozilla's new Firefox 64 keeps an eye on what you're up to and prompts you to try extensions and features that could help you with that activity, the browser maker said. For example, if you open the same tab lots of times, it could suggest you pin it to your tab strip for easier future access. Other suggestions include installing the Facebook Container extension to curtail the social network's snooping, a Google Translate extension to tap into Google's service, and the Enhancer for YouTube extension to do things like block ads and control playback on Google's video site.
The feature could help you customize Firefox more to your liking -- something that could help you stick with the browser in the face of Google Chrome's dominance. And that, in turn, could help Mozilla pursue its push toward a privacy-respecting web that's not just effectively controlled by Chrome.
The feature could help you customize Firefox more to your liking -- something that could help you stick with the browser in the face of Google Chrome's dominance. And that, in turn, could help Mozilla pursue its push toward a privacy-respecting web that's not just effectively controlled by Chrome.
In today's age, the first and foremost priority should be to stop the surveillance. Everything else is secondary.
Why didn't that come out right?
I guess it's not different than some of the tool tips in modern video games or Microsoft Office, but when it comes to a browser that's a bit much. It's like looking at the books I check out from the library only worse.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
If i dismiss enough of these stupid unsolicited popups, will it tell me how to turn the feature off in about:config?
Translation: Firefox now spams you with suggested extensions
Is it really "snooping" if neither the activity logs associated with this feature nor any information identifiably derived therefrom leaves the user's device? And if so, why should it be deemed objectionable?
I've given up on Firefox, so I shouldn't care, but please stop.
Last time I updated Firefox, it had "suggestions by pocket". To turn these off, it took ten minutes of googling to fix it, and then they still came back after another update.
Maybe I'm weird, but I thought the best browser is one that simply works, works fast, and then allows for extensions to do whatever extras that I want. This worked really well for firefox in the beginning, but now it is caught in the same trap of so many other programs. Power users want to be able to control things. Average users just want something that works. Do any of these features help either set of users?
...Mozilla's new Firefox 64 keeps an eye on what you're up to and prompts you ...
Please do not do this. The last thing I need is yet another program trying to make "suggestions" to me.
This is the exact opposite of what I want.
I spend a lot of time these days preventing software from interrupting me or dealing with the interruptions that I cannot figure out how to prevent. It would appear, Neo, that we are now working for the machines.
Oh dear, some clown has reinvented Clippy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
If there one useless annoyance that the WWW does *not* need, it's ****ing Clippy.
...Is it really "snooping"...
Yes. It is the collection of data, data that is not used for the primary reason I use the browser. I give Mozilla a foothold on my device, I do not expect Mozilla to collect data within that foothold for use outside the reason why I use Mozill'a product.
You mean extensions that Mozilla seems to regularly make not work once you get used to them?
Generally speaking computer geeks -- the kind of people who find themselves dragooned into giving other people technical support even when that's not their job -- tend to value customization-friendliness a lot more than normal people, who just want things to work in a predictable and stable way.
Really superficial things like wallpapers and ringtones aside, features intended to empower users to shape their user experience in functional ways tend not to have much market impact, although arguably they should have more.
Even computer geeks don't have an unlimited appetite for customization, or not all of them, at least. But we tend to act as if other people do.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The data are still ON the device and therefore vulnerable to examination. This is similar to "undo close tab" is a security risk (in that the knowledge of previously opened tabs remains on the device/in-memory even after the tabs are closed). The feature works even when in private mode, which is supposed to never retain history.
Not a huge deal, but it's something you have to consider. If I lived in a country where videos of cats wearing pajamas was considered objectionable content, and Firefox kept a record of my visiting an obscure cats-in-pajamas web site AND a count of how many times I visited it, the government official pounding on my door to accuse me of a feline sleepware violation could use a tool to extract that information.
Entire argument above is obviously invalid if these new features respect private mode browsing.
WTF?? Then why did they spend the last years or ripping everything I liked out? (From the status bar to XUL extensions)
[citation needed]
It's right there in the TFA:
The suggestions are prompted by Firefox itself. Mozilla doesn't know what you're up to.
It will have a pre-existing list of recommendations, it won't query Mozilla "what recommendation(s) do you have for facebook.com" when/if you go there. They'll probably know if you install the extension, but not whether it's because you didn't want it or you don't use Facebook.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
It's hard to believe its been 16 years since Phoenix was first released, that promised to be just a browser. In these times of increasing chromization of browsers, we need a responsible Firefox, not a ad-infested one (suggestions = ads).
I need a web browser that doesn't try and think for itself.
Curl, lynx, or custom coding it are looking more attractive all the time.
Suggestions?
There are so many ways to gather information on people without "gathering information on people." Depending on how they've implemented this, they can absolutely reconstruct what information generated certain recommendations.
If you go to "get addons" in Firefox, it will query the Firefox servers to get information about the addons and little thumbnails and logos for them. If these are not included with whatever data Firefox uses to generate the recommendations - congratulations, Mozilla now knows what addons Firefox is recommending to you, even if they never "sent that data" to Mozilla. Because they did send it, effectively, to pull the logos and addon data.
If the recommendations and set of addons are unique enough, you've effectively created a unique fingerprint. Depending on how the recommendations are generated, you can then figure out what set of sites a user used to generate them.
Firefox cannot possibly guarantee that Mozilla doesn't get this data, because addons are ultimately downloaded from Mozilla. Even if all they see are the addons people grab, based on the set of those addons, they can build a pretty good profile of the user getting them.
Lucky for you, we have modern technology to help you do that!
Orwell calls it "Pre-Chrome"
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Are you sure the data isn't being collected anyway? Web browsers need to store this information anyway to ensure browser history (your back button, and purple links) and the cache works. It sounds to me as if Mozilla is just finding a new use for the data Firefox is storing anyway.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
about:preferences
Scroll down to Browsing section.
Uncheck "Recommend extensions as you browse"
There! I made it even better!
Can I have a browser that, you know, JUST BROWSES THE DAMN INTERNET.
This version kills Live Bookmarks. Some of us FF old-timers are hopelessly reliant on these things, and it's, as far as I have found, the fastest way to quickly scan lists of headlines from all your favorite sites at once. Seriously, one click and you can quickly mouse over the sites on your bookmarks toolbar to consume hundreds of headlines.
I really, REALLY hate that they're killing this feature, but this addon promises to restore it: https://www.ghacks.net/2018/07...
Here's the official GitHub: https://github.com/nt1m/livema...
I opened it today, and it popped up a little piece about new "content blocking" for privacy.
I clicked to the second page, and it demanded that I turn on javascript to see the content . . . .
noscript notes "trackertest.org" as having been blocked . . .
hawk
they want to suggest new ones?
Are the new ones from sources that donated money to Mozilla?
Go ahead. Been done before.
I acknowledge there exist a minority of WWW users who browse all incognito all the time, with no browser history, no password manager, no back button, and never logging into any website. But there's a continuum between that and the present sitaution of surveillance capitalism.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
What's your solution? Have all extensions automatically installed with Firefox?
This is similar to "undo close tab" is a security risk (in that the knowledge of previously opened tabs remains on the device/in-memory even after the tabs are closed)
Never really thought of it that way. The fix is simple. When I accidentally close a tab I know within an awshitasecond I messed up (thank you websites that 9 times out of 10 you open a new tab for links, but that 1 in 10 always has me closing the parent tab).
The fix is 2 fold:
1) Only save one closed tab
2) After 5 minutes forget about the closed tab.
I was wondering, do you think Netscape does that?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
When I accidentally close a tab I know within an awshitasecond I messed up
We do use Ctrl+Alt+Tab for that, don't we?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I just installed it and once again I have to go looking for, and re-installing all of my extensions. Why can't Firefox see what extensions I have and upgrade them at the same time? I get them from the Mozillia website.
I use subscriptions as a RSS reader. I have them all across my top bar. That's how I got here, through my /. subscription.
I am going to hate that. Can't they just let me browse the web without interfering? Clippy went there before.
How does the meat bag come to know what exists and what is even wantable in the first place?
You appear to claim that only a "naive child" would believe that extension suggestion in Firefox, which is distributed as free software, does not exfiltrate your habits. Of the following scenarios, which are you claiming is the case?
A. That the published source code of Firefox contains code to exfiltrates your habits
B. That the executable contains code to exfiltrate your habits not present in the published source code
Historically, anonymized data turns out to be not as anonymous as it was claimed to be. Put differently, de-anonymization is more possible than people try to lead others to believe it is. One example is the 2006 AOL search data which AOL anonymized and purposefully published with high-minded goals—to help researchers. It turned out that the query data was sufficient to let the New York Times determine that user #4417749 was Thelma Arnold, a 62-year-old widow from Lilburn, Georgia, thus objectively proving that AOL's anonymization was inadequate. AOL's then-Chief Technical Officer, Maureen Govern, resigned from AOL, and two AOL employees were fired as a result of the proven de-anonymization.
Another problem is the principle behind your question: if the user has no opportunity to stop this from happening then what you're describing is indistinguishable from snooping on the user. This means that no matter how this is implemented or how undesirable this feature might be, Firefox's saving grace is that it is free software—free to all users to run, inspect, share, and modify. Multiple Firefox derivatives are objective proof that people use their software freedom. This software freedom also raises the bar for raising security and privacy issues in discussions like these: anyone raising the issue should be expected to make a more compelling case to back their claim by identifying the lines of Firefox source code that implement sending any data to Mozilla (and/or third parties involved in this). Mozilla says they don't send data anywhere to implement this feature; they say Firefox picks from canned recommendations and thus this isn't a privacy issue. It's possible that the recommendation ends up looking up something that itself could indirectly reveal something about the user's browsing the user would not want revealed.
I'd prefer not to have the browser analyze browsing habits at all, nor bother me with such suggestions. So I'm not enthusiastic about this alleged feature no matter how it is implemented. I prefer that the browser get on with doing what I consider to be the primary job of a web browser, regardless of how easy it was to implement, how little CPU time is involved, or any other technocratic detail of its implementation. I'll manually research which add-ons to install and use if and when I want such assistance.
Digital Citizen
Waterfox and Basilisk, too.
“Mozilla's new Firefox 64 keeps an eye on what you're up to and prompts you to .. help you with that activity”
Does it also report such activity back to the Mozilla?
So if Mozilla doesn't tell me what I want, how will I ever know?
Does your computer always wag you, or just when you browse the internet?
As a webmaster I hate how they block http web sites by default without making you add exceptions. This could potentially scare noobs. No I wont pay for a https certificate for my small hobbiest website! Not a browser I recommend any more.
Hey, it works great. It just suggested I try Chrome.
'Nuf sed.