[clug] Firefox browser ... collects data about you -There are different APIs and formats to collect data in Firefox

Bob Edwards bob at cs.anu.edu.au
Sat Dec 7 04:18:10 UTC 2019


On 7/12/19 1:40 pm, Chris Smart via linux wrote:
> On Sat, 7 Dec 2019, at 12:59, George at Clug via linux wrote:
>> My paranoia triggered again. But maybe the data leakage is not that
>> serious after all?
>>
> 
> When you first start Firefox, it pops up a notification telling you that it's sending some information (See https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/privacy/firefox/), with a link to turn it off if you want to. It's not opt-in by default which would be nicer, but at least they are up-front about it.
> 
> The setting is under about:preferences#privacy under "Firefox Data Collection and Use."
> 
> "We strive to provide you with choices and collect only what we need to provide and improve Firefox for everyone. We always ask permission before receiving personal information."
> 
> Also, this might be worth a read:
> 
> https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2019/10/22/latest-firefox-brings-privacy-protections-front-and-center-letting-you-track-the-trackers/
> 
> -c
> 

Further to that, there are other options to further protect your
privacy. Remember that there are several excellent Free/Open Source
web browsers available, Firefox is but one of them. All of them
include instructions on how to compile them for yourself.

So what? Well, if you really care, you could get into the Firefox
code and disable all the "telemetry" (I think it is just one config
option to change).

You could also choose to use the torbrowser (built on Firefox),
which already does all of this for you - and more. There are even
instructions on how to compile torbrowser for yourself (some of
that is quite educational just from the point of view of seeing what
the TOR folk do to the Firefox code base to tighten it up).

The sorts of things that Firefox is likely to be spying on you is
likely a lot less than what your ISP knows about you just from your
DNS lookups (note: I don't actually know this, I am just guessing).
So consider using a VPN before being too concerned about what Firefox
is blabbing to Mozilla about you (and be careful about which VPN you
use - how do you spell Honeypot again?).

cheers,
Bob Edwards.



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