Mozilla is Introducing 'Terms of Use' to Firefox
www.omgubuntu.co.uk
Hot off the back of its recent leadership rejig, Mozilla has announced users of Firefox will soon be subject to a 'Terms of Use' policy — a first for the

From the new terms:

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.

  • lambalicious@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    9·
    8 hours ago

    Honestly you already start at paragraph 1 with a wrong premise and then go down from there. Allow me to point you to the very beginning, to your first emphasis:

    You give Mozilla all rights necessary to operate Firefox,

    This doesn’t mean you’re giving them a license to do whatever they want with your data, it means you’re giving them the ability to use that data explicitly as you choose to navigate the web.

    Here’s the trick: they are not operating Firefox, we are. It’s a system that runs locally and under our instruction on our devices. When I type something in the URL bar, or when I click Open File, or when I mouse over the screen, Mozilla doesn’t have to do anything: everyhting happens locally. No data should be being transmitted or be processed over their systems: Firefox is not a remote desktop / “live service” application.

    …Unless…

    And there you have it. That’s why those terms are here.

    • ArchRecord@lemm.eeEnglish
      1·
      20 minutes ago

      You’re not including the full relevant text. For context, let me just put the full clause here:

      You give Mozilla all rights necessary to operate Firefox, including processing data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice, as well as acting on your behalf to help you navigate the internet. 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.

      Notice the “including processing data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice” part, which means that part just clarifies their existing ability to, for instance, collect telemetry to understand how people are using the browser, and what features are used most.

      Then going forward, “as well as acting on your behalf to help you navigate the internet.” This would be any feature that relies on a Mozilla product to provide you with the ability to interact with any content on the internet. Think their Relay VPN product, any default DNS servers they apply, etc.

      However, the key part was this:

      you hereby grant us a […] license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox.

      This clause effectively restricts any use of the data, to that which you explicitly indicate with your use, specifically only in the context of navigating, experiencing, and interacting with online content.

      In other words, the rights you grant are only granted:

      1. When necessary…
      2. …to make the browser function…
      3. …and specifically solely for the purpose of passing on that data to let you interact with online content, only as you personally indicate you want that data used.

      This clause does not state that Mozilla gets a license to use your data whenever, for any purpose, it states they get a license to use it only when necessary, to make the browser function, specifically only as you choose to use that data when browsing. These are completely different things.