I’m going to need some sources for that claim or I’m calling bullshit. I have never heard anyone claim that and I have seen absolutely zero evidence suggesting that.
edit:
these are the closest things I could find,
https://www.theverge.com/2024/3/22/24109116/mozilla-ends-onerep-data-removal-partnership
https://videoweek.com/2022/02/10/mozilla-partners-with-meta-for-privacy-preserving-attribution/
and neither is bad. meta is a questionable choice for privacy cooperation but even in that it makes sure no one, not even meta, can read those match keys
I believe a lot of info I got was from this video but it’s been a while so I’m not too sure: https://youtu.be/ugnOM2mzgNU
Also yea Firefox sends a lot of telemetry data and stuff, even if you disable the option in the menu. You have to go to the developer mode to remove all of it. Check “hardened Firefox”. If there is an hardened Firefox, then there is a non-hardened Firefox.
And then there are all the contracts and calls to Google’s server, for example for geolocation and stuff
And if you want the ultimate proof, everything is in their privacy policy https://www.mozilla.org/fr/privacy/firefox/ - just see how much data they collect, use and share, for better or for worse.
after reading the privacy site that doesn’t sound too bad. or at least “tracks you private data and shares it with their business partners” bad which makes it sound like they are literally spying on you.
they do send telemetry data yes, but not your ip or anything that could be used to track against you, they do share some data while using the search function from url bar which is prettt much necessary and that seems to be only the stuff you typed.
most of it seems to just be about sponsored content where they send the amount of clicks and time when those clicks happened so advertisers know some statistics and advertisors get their royalties. firefox does suggest you content based on your browsing history but that happens locally. in no point does you browsing history go outside your computer, which is the most important part to me. they do know what was suggested, but not how it was suggested
so in conclusion, they do send some device information, information about your clicks and where those clicks happened and some other very basic telemetry with no information that could be tracked to you.
of course if one want the ultimate privacy that can be a dealbreaker. but to say that they collect your private data is quite an overstatement imo. I couldn’t give a damn if my browsing is part of some anonymous statistics.
but yeah in a way you’re correct, they do collect data. like almost literally every application does in the modern era
Did you forget about geolocation?
Mozilla’s websites are full of trackers too, and they are largely funded by Google. How can you protect privacy when your biggest customer gains money by tracking? Seems like a clear conflict of interest.
And it’s not a bit of telemetry data, it’s literally your entire computer config, number of tabs open, duration… they claim not to log IPs, but can you really trust them? The point is you’re constantly pinging with your IP to their servers for useless reasons. They literally sell your data by sharing it to their “business partners”.
They also send the url of all files you download to Google by default. Great. That’s privacy!
(The video also gives some good points)
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/ugnOM2mzgNU
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
