Mozilla deletes promise not to sell Firefox users’ data
The hits just keep on coming. Mozilla not only changed its Privacy Notice and introduced a Terms of Use for Firefox for the first time with some pretty onerous terms, they also removed a rather specific question and answer pair from their page with frequently asked questions about Firefox, as discovered by David Gerard. The following question and answer were removed:
Does Firefox sell your personal data?
Nope. Never have, never will. And we protect you from many of the advertisers who do. Firefox products are designed to protect your privacy. That’s a promise.
↫ David Gerard detailing what has been removed
This promise is now gone from the website, a removal which tells you all you need to know about what Mozilla has in mind. Combine it with the much broadened data collection and buying and claiming to be an online advertising company, and what I have been predicting and warning everyone about has come to pass: Firefox has become a mere tool to collect user data, user data to be sold by Mozilla for the purposes of advertising.
For years I’ve been warning about this inevitable outcome, and for just as many years people told me I was overreacting, that it wouldn’t happen, that I was crazy. The problem is especially dire for the desktop Linux world, who soon might not have a browser they can safely include in their ISOs and base installations. A desktop Linux installation with Chromium where you have to manually drag and drop extensions to install them, and set up a Google API key just to get browser sync, isn’t exactly a great experience.
At this point I have no idea where to go. Chrome and its various skins are a no-go, obviously, and relatively soft forks like LibreWolf are still dependent on Firefox and Mozilla. Alternatives like Falkon also use the Chromium engine deep down, and have their own set of issues and lack of manpower to deal with. Apple users are somewhat lucky to have the WebKit-based Safari to work with, but I’d rather publish my personal data in The New York Times than trust Apple and Tim Cook.
We’re right back where we started. Lovely.