Firefox deletes promise to never sell personal data, asks users not to panic

[Kaz]

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Firefox maker Mozilla deleted a promise to never sell its users' personal data and is trying to assure worried users that its approach to privacy hasn't fundamentally changed. Until recently, a Firefox FAQ promised that the browser maker never has and never will sell its users' personal data. An archived version from January 30 says:

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.

That promise is removed from the current version. There's also a notable change in a data privacy FAQ that used to say, "Mozilla doesn't sell data about you, and we don't buy data about you."

 

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Users criticized Mozilla in discussions on GitHub and Reddit. One area of concern is over new terms of use that say, "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."

 

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Firefox deletes promise to never sell personal data, asks users not to panic

ARSTECHNICA.COM

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Mozilla says it deleted promise because “sale of data” is defined broadly.

 

Really disappointing.  I knew data brokerage was in the works back when they let people login to sync devices.  It was a reason to harvest bookmarks and history.  Someone has to pay for that data storage... 

 

Mozilla doesn't mention anything about this change when using the program.  Might be time to start looking for alternatives...  Shady contract updates without notice don't sit well with me.

[Sir Beregond]

Maybe its just me, but Firefox has always performed like garbage anytime I tried it, so I never really used it. Looks like more reason to avoid.

 

That said, I am still in the market for a new browser so will be curious to hear what others end up using.

[Kaz]

 

Louis is recommending LibreWolf.  He's of the opinion that Mozilla sucks at communicating but that this isn't a big deal.  California state law would classify that because Mozilla takes money from google to make them the default search engine, they are technically selling user data.

 

I'm sick of spending 20 minutes opting out of everything every time I install firefox.  I can never remember what about:config settings remove search with google and search with amazon from the address bar.  Anonymized data is often trivial to de-anonymize because users dox themselves in ways that the anonymization doesn't take into account.   A change in the terms of service is a change in the terms of service.  Their practices might be acceptable today, but nothing is stopping them from selling data to other companies.  Que Vader "I'm altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further."

[Snakecharmed]

There are several more privacy-conscious forks of Firefox that I trust more than main line Firefox since probably over a decade ago when whichever one of Mozilla's earlier privacy controversies came to light.

 

Floorp - Most customizable UI

LibreWolf - Most privacy conscious, rendering may break on some websites out-of-the-box because all privacy-focused settings are enabled by default

Waterfox - My daily driver for over 7 years now, best balance of privacy and customization of the two above, has Widevine support

[GanjaSMK]

Anyone using LibreWolf? I read a recommendation on it and tried it; but dunno how native support is - Netflix doesn't like it LOL. 

 

Anyone else use/like it? I like the privacy aspect of it. 

 

I've been using Edge for well over a year now... got it slimmed down with a few tweaks and the adblock/script blocking works since Chromium based. 

Edited March 3 by GanjaSMK

[Kaz]

  On 03/03/2025 at 23:50, GanjaSMK said:

Anyone using LibreWolf? I read a recommendation on it and tried it; but dunno how native support is - Netflix doesn't like it LOL. 

 

Anyone else use/like it? I like the privacy aspect of it. 

 

I've been using Edge for well over a year now... got it slimmed down with a few tweaks and the adblock/script blocking works since Chromium based. 

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I made the switch.  DRM is disabled by default but can be enabled in the settings under general. 

I had fingerprint prevention checked and it locked out the ability to select dark mode, which just tells websites I want a dark mode version if they have one.  When I looked it up online people recommended using "Dark Reader".  I found dark reader wasn't very good.  Some websites maintained a white border along the sides until I did farther tweaking by enabling filter or filter +, neither of which look that good compared to regular Firefox dark mode.  In the end I disabled browser fingerprint protection and switched LibreWolf to dark mode.

 

I'm probably easy to fingerprint due to ublock, no-script, and privacy badger.  I don't know if LibreWolf is telling websites I am using it instead of Firefox (maybe @pio knows...), but between all of those there are relatively few people who fit the description.  Waterfox used to tell websites I was using it instead of Firefox and that gave me problems with some websites that would check the web browser.  I didn't meet their approved browsers of the latest Firefox, chrome, or safari.  In the end I stopped using Waterfox and tweaked Firefox to fit my needs.  I don't know if Waterfox ever fixed that problem. 

[Snakecharmed]

  On 04/03/2025 at 03:33, Kaz said:

Waterfox used to tell websites I was using it instead of Firefox and that gave me problems with some websites that would check the web browser.  I didn't meet their approved browsers of the latest Firefox, chrome, or safari.  In the end I stopped using Waterfox and tweaked Firefox to fit my needs.  I don't know if Waterfox ever fixed that problem. 

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Yes, Waterfox defaults to the same user agent string as the Firefox extended service release now.

[Kaz]

Ongoing update to this topic:

 

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Mozilla is revising its new Terms of Use for Firefox introduced on Wednesday following criticisms over language that seemed to give the company broad ownership over user data. With the change, “we’re updating the language to more clearly reflect the limited scope of how Mozilla interacts with user data,” the company says in a Friday post.

The particular language that drew criticism was:

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 language has been removed. Now, the language in the terms says:

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.

 

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Mozilla is already revising its new Firefox terms to clarify how it handles user data

WWW.THEVERGE.COM

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The terms were just introduced on Wednesday.