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Comment on Why's everyone freaking out about Firefox Terms of Service? Isn't it Open Source?

CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

The rationalization they have given is that legally, they may have been seeking data all along, as some jurisdictions define it extremely loosely.

For example, if you use their translation feature, they are sending the page your looking at (data) to a third party, which provides a benefit to Mozilla.

blog.mozilla.org/en/…/update-on-terms-of-use/

| The reason we’ve stepped away from making blanket claims that “We never sell your data” is because, in some places, the LEGAL definition of “sale of data” is broad and evolving. As an example, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) defines “sale” as the “selling, renting, releasing, disclosing, disseminating, making available, transferring, or otherwise communicating orally, in writing, or by electronic or other means, a consumer’s personal information by [a] business to another business or a third party” in exchange for “monetary” or “other valuable consideration.”

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notabot@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
The current intention may not be malicious, but it leaves the way open for changes that are to slip in. If they were worried about services like translation being concidered ‘sales’, which is a reasonable concern, they should have split them out of the core browser into an extension and put the ‘might sell your data’ licence on that.

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- CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Yeah, its definitely wide open for abuse now. But the California law also seems way too vague as well. What about DNS lookup? That takes a users input and transfers it to someone else, is that a “sale”? Can hardly start separating that out of the browser? Http requests? Its all users initiated, but is it a “sale” in California? Not a lawyer, haven’t a clue.
  
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  - notabot@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    DNS is fine as the exchange has to be for “monetary” or “other valuable consideration” to be considered a sale. The issue seems to be that Mozilla were profiting off of things like adverts placed on the new tab page, and possibly from the translation service too.
    
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    CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    I’m not a lawyer, but “other valuable consideration” seems very broad. For DNS, getting the returned IP address is valuable. Ditto for http, getting the returned webpage is valuable?
    
    I only suggested the translation thing because it (imo) fell under a “transfer of data for value provided”, which makes it a sale?
    
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CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
The privacy centric way for Mozilla to have address this would have been to:

acknowledge laws in certain countries have changed

Due to those new laws, the definition of “sell” has changed and Firefox may no longer be in compliance with their desire to keep your data private

Commit their desire to take the necessary steps to keep new versions of Firefox in line with their original vision

update the “we will not sell” definition to within the jurisdiction of the United States, or indicate that the definition of sell may be different in different jurisdictions

make the necessary extensions to jurisdictions where they were “selling” user data, self reporting where necessary
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- CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Yup, its been terribly handled. Dunno if it was driven by a panicy lawyer, but those steps would have been much better. At a minimum, that blog post should have come first.
  
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swordgeek@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
Here’s the crux of the problem.

Mozilla went from “explicitly not malicious” to “probably not malicious yet.”

What’s next?

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- CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Yup. And it doesn’t help that they have been throwing away good will for a while now, with their crypto/AI/etc bandwagon jumping. They are still the least worst option, as I dont trust the forks either, but its getting hard to trust them.
  
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y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
I love how California basically defines a sale as “exchanging things for money” and Firefox is like, “its such a craaazy world we can’t even agree on the definition of exchanging things for money out here! Some call it a ‘sale’ apparently, so if we’re gonna exchange your data for money I guess we have to call it a ‘sale’… Stupid California, changing things to mean what they’ve always meant”

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- CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Its even more broad than that, because its any exchange of data for valuable consideration. No money has to change hands, but if it benefits FF, its a sale. And the benefit could simply be “if we do this we will function correctly as a browser”.
  
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Danitos@reddthat.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
Something to note, however, is that the new terms apply to the browser as a whole. If it was due to some of the opt-in services the browser includes (sync, account, translation, etc.), they could have specified the terms apply to those services instead.

Agree this isn’t necessarily malicious yet, but it definitely is not beneficial to users.

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swordgeek@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

The rationalization they have given…

Anything you say after this point is irrelevant. (Nothing personal, though.)

As soon as a company has to rationalise their legal back-pedalling, it is explicit evidence that they are intending to do wrong.

This will not end well.

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- CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  If the legal definition of a term has changed such that their current activities now fall under it, changing the terms of use legal document does make sense.
  
  They are pretty clear that under California law, they are “selling” data. They have two options, keep the ToU document the same, and try meet the new laws requirements (which as I’ve said in other comments, seems impossible for a browser - not a lawyer though), or update their ToU without changing their current behaviors.
  
  They have gone with the latter, but it does also allow them to be far more “evil”. Its definitely the first step down a bad road, time will tell if they go further.
  
  If you want to play it safe, block their domains via pihole: wiki.mozilla.org/Websites/…/Mozilla_Owned
  
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  - swordgeek@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    
    time will tell if they go further.
    
    Having seen this FAR too often, I have a different view:
    
    Capitalism and greed will determine when they go further.
    
    There is no “if” about it. Mitchell Baker is in it to get rich by destroying the platform, and is sharing enough of the corpse’s leavings with others to make sure they protect her.
    
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    CameronDev@programming.dev ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    I’m aware that history is against them. The one thing in Firefox’s (not Mozilla) favour is that its open source. The browser and codebase will live on even if Mozilla crashes and burns.
    
    The forks already exist, the only “moat” that Mozilla has is trust and goodwill, which they are burning rapidly.
    
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sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
If this translation feature is a problem, they should argue with those countries that it’s not a sale.

If they can’t do that, then maybe sacrifice the translation feature to safeguard user rights.

It seems like they are looking for any excuse to allow selling data eventually.

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