Comment on Mozilla is already revising its new Firefox terms to clarify how it handles user data

• ArchRecord@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  Ask the lawmakers who wrote the laws with vague language, because according to them, that kind of activity could be considered a sale.

  As a more specific example that is more one-sided, but still not technically a “sale,” Mozilla has sponsored links on the New Tab page. (they can be disabled of course)

  These links are provided by a third-party, relatively privacy protecting ad marketplace. Your browser downloads a list of links from them if you have sponsored links turned on, and no data is actually sent to their service about you. If you click a sponsored link, a request is sent using a protocol that anonymizes your identity, that tells them the link was clicked. That’s it, no other data about your identity, browser, etc.

  This generates revenue for Mozilla that isn’t reliant on Google’s subsidies, that doesn’t actually sell user data. Under these laws, that would be classified as a sale of user data, since Mozilla technically transferred data from your device (that you clicked the sponsored link) for a benefit. (financial compensation)

  However, I doubt anyone would call that feature “selling user data.” But, because the law could do so, they have to clarify that in their terms, otherwise someone could sue them saying “you sold my data” when all they did was send a small packet to a server saying that some user, somewhere clicked the sponsored link.

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  • Lifter@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    I would definitely call that selling my data. The recipient can now add that to my profile as an interest.

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    • ArchRecord@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      The recipient doesn’t get any identifying data about you, because the data that shows the link was clicked does not identify you as an individual, since it’s passed through privacy-preserving protocols.

      To further clarify the exact data available to any party:

      • The ad marketplace only knows that someone, somewhere clicked the link.
      • Mozilla knows that roughly x users have clicked sponsored links overall.
      • The company you went to from that sponsored link knows that your IP/browser visited at X time, and you clicked through a sponsored link from the ad marketplace

      There isn’t much of a technical difference between this, and someone seeing an ad in-person where they type in a link, from a practical privacy perspective.

      Their implementation is completely different from traditional profile/tracking-based methods of advertising.

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