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Mozilla rewrites Firefox's Terms of Use after user backlash (techcrunch.com)
submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

This isn't a one-off thing, it's part of a trend, and that's the part that I'm worried about. If everything was peachy except for one small TOS change I'd shrug and say it was an oversight. Mozilla is dipping their toes into advertising though, which IMO has a corrosive effect that will keep nudging them towards privacy invasion. Here's a few examples:

They removed this section from the FAQ:

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.

Why would they go out of their way to remove that unless they're selling it or are planning to? (before and after)

And then the Firefox Privacy Notice states:

Mozilla collects technical and interaction data, such as the position, size, views and clicks on New Tab content or ads, to understand how people are interacting with our content and to personalize future content, including sponsored content. This data may be shared with our advertising partners on a de-identified or aggregated basis.

They're selling your data and it's opt-out, not opt-in. That's not cool IMO. They also bought an advertising company, and they're not doing that because they're moving away from advertising as a business model.

Yes, they're saying a few nice things about "privacy-preserving", but good anonymization is hard, they've got a clear trend towards advertising and making money off of selling your data, and there's no good reason for the trend to stop at "just the tip". So to wrap that all back around to the submitted article, here's what they changed to it first:

When you upload or input information through Firefox, you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox.

That's super vague, does "selling my data to advertisers" count as "helping me experience online content"? I obviously don't think so, but does Mozilla agree? Here's the updated one after the backlash:

You give Mozilla the rights necessary to operate Firefox. This includes processing your data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice. It also includes a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license for the purpose of doing as you request with the content you input in Firefox. This does not give Mozilla any ownership in that content.

"Purpose of doing as you request with the content you input" is a lot better language that is less vague. It's not perfect (silently adding in opt-out features probably counts as "doing what I request"), but is still way better.

Which is all to say that I think this change was indeed cause for concern, the backlash helped improve the language, and that Mozilla no longer sparks joy.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Why would they go out of their way to remove that unless they’re selling it or are planning to? (before and after)

Why would they go out of their way to remove a section on their website that uses the word sell when they're legally obligated to use correct terminology according to the jurisdictions they operate in? I think the answer to that question is completely obvious, but since others might have missed it. They stated that sell now means something that it didn't in jurisdictions they operate in. Since that definition has changed they can't leave language up on the website that continues to use that word.

And then the Firefox Privacy Notice states:

that has been there for years. That's why this ToS stuff is nonsense. If people cared about it then it would have been a big deal when that was first added.

They’re selling your data and it’s opt-out, not opt-in. That’s not cool IMO. They also bought an advertising company, and they’re not doing that because they’re moving away from advertising as a business model.

Pocket is owned by Mozilla. It operates as a separate subsidiary, but they're sharing it with their 'partners' by sharing it with themselves. If you click on a Pocket link, then you will of course get whatever advertising and tracking you do on the pocket website. Since Mozilla owns Pocket they're notifying you of this.

Yes, they’re saying a few nice things about “privacy-preserving”, but good anonymization is hard, they’ve got a clear trend towards advertising and making money off of selling your data, and there’s no good reason for the trend to stop at “just the tip”.

please provide one piece of proof that they're selling your data. Mozilla is working pretty dang hard to make sure that the internet continues to exist without destroying users privacy. I've read over how the token aggregation works for their deanonymization and it's perfectly privacy preserving. If they just wanted to sell your data they would do that. They wouldn't go inventing new forms of privacy preserving deanonymization ad tokens.

Quoting someone on HN:

That lawyers are spooked. That's all there is. California changed the rules and that made every lawyer in an organization that can't have a portrayed legal battle with the state very nervous. Nothing in the language says that they can do things that they couldn't do before.

Quoting another person on HN:

Title is a complete lie/misleading. They get a license, not ownership.

Let's dissect what it actually says, and we do it backwards, because given the discussion around this subject it seems like people space out or have their mind clouded by outrage before they get to the end of the sentence:

help you [do things] as you indicate with your use of Firefox.

So this already only covers things that you indicate you want to do with your use of Firefox. Meaning that if you hit some button, Mozilla now has a license to process the data they need to make that button work and nothing more. That means unless you give them additional permission somewhere, they can't, for example, also store and process that information to train some AI model or whatever. All they're allowed to use it for is making whatever you interacted with work. Seems pretty reasonable.

to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content

This further narrows the scope to websites and such you interact with (online content). It also says that license only covers "helping" you with these things. The part we looked at previously narrows this to your intent.

you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license

So just a license. No transfer of ownership is happening.

When you upload or input information through Firefox

Note that this says "through". They're clearly only trying to cover their butt as an intermediary by obtaining a license to process your information to act as such an intermediary. Explicitly nothing more.

Putting it back together we get:

When you upload or input information through Firefox, you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox.

Important part in cursive.

So broadly what is the license for?

license [..] to help you [..] as you indicate

Funnily enough if you actually read that thread someone tries to use Word as an example:

I don't have to grant Word a license to what I type in it. This is a highly unusual clause that other software doesn't have.

and is immediately proven wrong:

Yes you do.

From Microsoft's Services Agreement [1]:

To the extent necessary to provide the Services to you and others, to protect you and the Services, and to improve Microsoft products and services, you grant to Microsoft a worldwide and royalty-free intellectual property license to use Your Content, for example, to make copies of, retain, transmit, reformat, display, and distribute via communication tools Your Content on the Services.

That's broader than what Mozilla is asking for.

[1] https://www.microsoft.com/en/servicesagreement

Just the fact that the share button exists in word means they have this section just to cover their asses. This is just how ToSes work, and it's why people hate them so much.

Someone notes that the offline Office apps do not have this in their license, but they do, it's just explicitly called out in a separate document. Note, I pulled the 2016 Word License just to show that this has been a thing for a decade if not more. I'm too lazy to go pull it for further back.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Well, I don't think we're going to convince each other. I don't really find hairsplitting about what "sell" means to be convincing though. That's the sort of defense you use when you don't have a better one.

Nor do I find "But they already did the bad thing, you should've complained then" convincing (fyi people did complain). Also, that's clearly forming the trend that I'm talking about. This is not one small mistake, it's part of a clear, multi-year trend.

Pocket is owned by Mozilla.

FYI the link is about Anonym. The beef isn't that Mozilla is selling data to them (because they own them now), it's that Mozilla's incentives no longer align with users', exactly because they own an advertising business now. It's corrosive and inevitably enshittifying.

Using Word as an example isn't really convincing either. Of course Microsoft is going to throw in every shitty thing they can, because they're Microsoft. That's what they do. It shouldn't be mentioned in the same breath as or used as a justification for anything Mozilla does. But also, using a word processor shouldn't require that in the TOS.

please provide one piece of proof that they’re selling your data.

"Mozilla's partners receive de-identified information about interactions with the suggestions they've served." I don't really care if they're "selling" it or "giving it away". Straight from the horse's mouth, they're doing things with my data I don't like. Saying "partners" only means "Pocket" which means "Mozilla" isn't convincing either, because there's no reason that can't change on a whim.

If they just wanted to sell your data they would do that.

No, they'd instantly tank. Enshittifying must be done carefully for them, they need to slowly boil their frogs. The trend is clear, though.

I’ve read over how the token aggregation works for their deanonymization and it’s perfectly privacy preserving

I've also read over the DES specification and it's perfectly secure. Except I'm not a cryptographer and my "verification" isn't worth anything. Even if it's perfect now, they will poke holes in that to maximize profit over time, because that's what they're incentivized to do now. Mozilla should fire anyone that thought advertising was a good business model, and align themselves with users' interests.