Are you opening it in a (Facebook) container perhaps?
3,507 karma · joined July 2, 2017
If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.
When the setting labelled "Allow Firefox to send technical and interaction data to Mozilla" is unchecked, the browser still sends out technical and interaction data through parameters added to various browser-provided/generated URLs (e.g. search results pages from built-in search providers, Firefox documentation links provided by the browser, DevTools compatibility panel links to MDN, etc.), by sending out pings when hovering over or clicking interactive browser-native interface elements, and in several other ways.
In summary: that setting is non-functional and should either be fixed, re-labelled, or removed entirely.
Regardless:
The browser asks me if I allow it to make these connections.
I tell it in unmistakable and irrevocable terms that I do not.
The browser makes these connections anyway.
The problem was never the connections or the contents of the data stream. You were aware of this before posting your comment, and yet you commented anyway. You are a troll.
1: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-stop-firefox-making...
Even with all telemetry disabled (including the option "Allow Firefox to send technical and interaction data to Mozilla") and without anything showing on that page, the browser still sends out interaction data by means of so called "pings", URL parameters, etc.
See this article (not by myself) and comment thread from two weeks ago for further details:
You might even encourage some of those criminal acts that will be performed through this browser.
Let me know if there is anything else or more specific you'd like to know.
As for the extensions I listed in my older comment, as far as I remember:
- Even though the extension policy explicitly and unconditionally forbids it, they were all sending some form of telemetry to either Google or Sentry without so much as a mention or let alone having provided any sort of opt-out controls.
- Some would load and run external scripts at runtime (not limited to "just" Google Analytics/Tags stuff), none of which appeared to be nefarious in nature - when I checked them over after downloading them directly, that is. Obviously, as is the whole point behind not allowing them, the external script could simply be swapped out for something else one day, or a different one could be served depending on whether it was requested by the extension.
- One of them would occasionally advertise the author's other extensions when new or updated, either with a weird in-page popup notification or a video announcement on YouTube, which it would hijack the current tab or create and focus a new one for to show.
- Tracking parameters would be added to outgoing links by several extensions, including ones to third parties which I guess were partners/affiliates which is also forbidden.
Tangent: Funny thing is that even Firefox itself ignores a disabled "Allow Firefox to send technical and interaction data to Mozilla" setting by tacking on parameters to all of the preinstalled search engine providers' results pages, and all external pages the browser provides links to such as documentation, legal, support, and other Mozilla product pages. Perhaps no PII, but interaction data is interaction data and no is no.
Of course this isn't all, and there are more offenders besides those extensions I listed before. Just downloading the extension (from the extension page, easiest to use a different browser and "save as" since Firefox will ask to install), unpacking the XPI archive, and grepping for common telemetry service names/collection endpoints or suspicious terms like "promo" or "utm" will do it in most cases (Mozilla extension review team should try it sometime). Although let me know if you want some more pointers or details on specific extensions.
I've reported these and several other extensions again every time they were updated in great technical detail and through various official channels, but stopped bothering when about a year and several extension updates later nothing had changed.
You will be amazed at the obvious extension policy violations Mozilla is letting many of their "recommended" extensions get away with.
[1]: https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/browse...
[2]: https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/networking/http/logg...
[3]: https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/about_...
My confusion must have come from mixed terminology being used by others than yourself on GitHub and in articles about your project I skimmed through when looking into it.
The project might still not be for me regardless of its underpinning, although I will have to say that it's immediately obvious that you persue high standards and care a great deal about delivering a quality product.
It's a proprietary container interface that - as far as I could tell - runs on the outdated and unsupported "docker machine"[1]. An alternative would be to run a more recent container runtime of your choosing in a VM through UTM which works beautifully.
Things aren't set in stone either. The most effective method to communicate over long distances used to be carrier pigeons, but only because they hadn't yet invented the telegraph.
No one is forcing the website owners to sign up with Cloudflare to enable this service with these aggressive configurations, and yet I understand why they would even just pre-emptively. It's cheap and effective, there's no denying that.
It is Cloudflare Inc. (66,59USD, +23.57USD/54.79% YTD), however, that architected the solution, markets it as a service, and controls it as a core part of their (i.e. everyone's) internet architecture.
As a serviceprovider they could be better at informing their customers of these unintentional side-effects and how they impact otherwise innocent visitors, but whose mental disorders/impairments cause them to be flagged for and having to undergo additional verification steps disproportionately more than others, likely due to some atypical behavioural patterns they show and their often adjusted hardsoftware setups producing an unconventional signature.
Some modifications to the system could probably be made on the architectural level too. We can get people in wheelchairs to the top of the empire state building, surely we can also find a solution that allows us to enjoy the benefits of these protective measures without wrecking the web's inclusivity and accessibility this much every time the measures need to be stepped up.
Am I asking for too much, what do you think?
"There must be some way out of here," said the joker to the thief
"There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief"Besides, those solutions have far too much in common with blackmail/extortion to my liking. Either you continue to suffer this structural harassment, or hand over all your bits and maybe in specific cases suffer slightly less! :)
For people going through life with ADHD such as myself, the impact of all these delays and disruptions throughout the day can be severe. Despite being properly medicated this measure is absolutely debilitating and makes for a dreadful and very taxing online experience.
The vast majority of third party applications are also sending everything they can access and then some, often far exceeding in scope and nowhere even close to meeting the privacy and security standards as is claimed in the relevant policies.
Telemetry endpoints are increasingly being CNAME masked or called through anynymous proxies. Betraying the customer/user trust this way is absolutely despicable. Shipping normal release channel apps with a Sentry SDK configured to run in debug mode seems to be the new meta for some reason (nothing good, probably).
And then there's Mozilla... Not only are many of their recommended extensions secretly sending telemetry and doing all sorts of other things that violate their extension policies multiple times over (strict verification and thorough code auditing process my arse), but Firefox itself includes UTM and other tracking parameters in its outgoing links to third parties (including all preinstalled search providers) even when "Allow Firefox to send technical and interaction data" is unmistakably set not to allow it.
Things would be different if this software were to have actually improved over time, but in most cases the opposite is true. Thinking about it, the more telemetry an app collects, the faster it seems to deteriorate across the board. An example of two opposites on this spectrum would be VIM vs Spotify.
Being part of only a single group isn't really our thing though. Without something external to focus on we quickly tend go down this path of surprisingly efficient self-destructive behaviour that often involves lots of heavy weaponry. We are chaos incarnate :)
Humanity has always gravitated towards building societies centred around the concepts that modern-day nation states also embody. Our natural drive to band together and our tendency to be creating new fake problems all the time is certainly an interesting pairing at times.