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Comment by gabereiser | Hacker News Reader

Tracking is tracking, no matter what outcomes you derive from it.

You can actually see all of the telemetry data Firefox is sending by going to about:telemetry in your browser. You can also see all of the probes it could be collecting here: https://probes.telemetry.mozilla.org/ Keep in mind that the telemetry that is captured in Firefox goes through a thorough review process, so that it respects user privacy: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Data_Collection

This statement is false.

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.

Wow, a browser is making network connections, how dare it. Come on, these things are there so that if you are on "connected" to a network that require some registration, e.g. an airport, then you can actually be forwarded to that registration page.

Like what do you even think, Mozilla people are sitting on top of all that sweet

  PING www.mozilla.org (3.161.119.172) 56(84) bytes of data.
  64 bytes from server-3-161-119-172.vie50.r.cloudfront.net (3.161.119.172): icmp_seq=1 ttl=248 time=4.06 ms
  64 bytes from server-3-161-119-172.vie50.r.cloudfront.net (3.161.119.172): icmp_seq=2 ttl=248 time=4.16 ms
  64 bytes from server-3-161-119-172.vie50.r.cloudfront.net (3.161.119.172): icmp_seq=3 ttl=248 time=3.64 ms

What the hell would they do with that?

It makes these connections even when all the things mentioned in the official "How to stop Firefox from making automatic connections"[1] are disabled. This includes the captive portal detection you allude to.

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...

Am I really the troll, or those who bring down the only remaining truly libre, open-source browser engine over stupid nitpicky bullshits, while not contributing anything positive to improve on the status?

Just as a courtesy I'll let you know that I won't bite here. This is entirely pointless.

The point is, if you provide an option to turn off telemetry, it should be off. No exception. In this case of an airport connection requiring a registration page intranetwork, this occurs via first request through their proxy with header redirect.

The point is, don’t lie about saying you respect privacy with half-baked options and telemetry for me but not for thee bs. If I turn off telemetry, you aren’t allowed to send telemetry. Of any kind. Not a crash log. Not an install token. Not a call home to see if maybe possibly your on an airport wifi and make-our-app-work-edge-case()

There is a distinct difference between telemetry and the captive portal requests Firefox makes. The captive portal checks have nothing to do with telemetry and contain no payload, which is why they are not covered by that setting.

Captive portal detection was only brought up by the non-constructive commenter and isn't part of the problem.

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.

So your general thesis is that software that tracks errors and problems the software might have, and software that deliberately slows down the machine to make you buy new hardware A LA Apple is 100% the same thing?

The Apple throttling thing was specifically to extend the life of the device. When a battery is old, if the CPU is not throttled, the device will instantly power off when the draw is too high.

Apple was throttling the CPU when the battery was old and could not sustain such power draw peaks in an effort to make the device remain usable for a longer period with a mostly-consumed battery pack. Had they not done so, the device would be unusable sooner.

To assert that it is to make you buy new hardware is a factual error.

Propaganda. Even if, a user toggle would have worked wonders.

Which is what ended up being implemented. That was a PR disaster on apple's part, but their motivation was genuinely good. They could have just let the phones power off randomly, like they were 5-6 years old -- android wouldn't even know about them anymore.

Random poweroffs could not happen, not with the current those devices are drawing.

And what do you think happens when that currency level can’t be drawn from the battery? There literally were many reported cases of random reboots.

A replaceable battery is a better solution.

They are replaceable. In a service for a low fee after 6 years of usage.

Paying apple hundreds of dollars to do something the owner of the phone should be able to do while waiting in line at the store is not an acceptable alterative.

I’m saying anything that tracks a user is not good for mankind. Telemetry is increasingly used for nefarious purposes. I have no problem if you want to track your own apps, but you can leave me out of it. You can derive my behavior from my access, my id, and my requests. You do not need to track my clicks, my history, my search phrases, my shopping habits, my location (unless I grant it to you), my cookies…

You may not force feed me cookies.

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