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Firefox's beta feature "Smart Window" shared browsing and search history to AI models without prompting

⁨835⁩ ⁨likes⁩

Submitted ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Beep@lemmus.org⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2026/03/firefox-smart-window-hands-on

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  • the_riviera_kid@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    The speed at which firefox has been enshittified is as impressive as it is sad.

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    • DarkCloud@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      …and we’ll all suffer as climate change increases. Seriously, none of this shit is worth frying for.

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      • the_riviera_kid@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Dont worry the US and Israel are starting WW3 as we speak we will all be dead before then any way

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    • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      thier revenue entirely dependent on google, you can see why.

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  • XLE@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Relevant section:

    Smart Window uses ‘memories’, things Mozilla says “…it learns from your activity” to inform its responses.

    You can delete memories individually, and you can set any given chat session to not use/store them.

    Fine so far.

    The problem? My memory list isn’t populated with things Smart Window learned since I enabled it. Oh no.

    It has activity going back months. We’re talking searches and website interactions from long before I enabled this. features.

    Firefox just handed that history to the AI models to plough from, without telling me upfront.

    I found this the creepiest aspect of Smart Window.

    Mozilla says this was a flub; it will refine the onboarding around Smart Window to limit memory formation to post-opt-in activity only. That’s obviously the right fix.

    Because sharing a user’s prior browsing history with third-party AI models, silently, on feature activation, without any headset? Yeah, a bit icky – but that’s the price of testing features that are finished, I guess.

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    • floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I’m willing to give them a pass since this was a development build and while someone probably should’ve thought of it, it’s the kind of bug that can happen. If this was the public release it would be a lot more outrageous.

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      • XLE@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Finding out about this gives me some extra questions, though.

        • Was this data summarized on enabling this window, or before?
        • Did it use an existing model, or re-use one that someone may have already downloaded for a different feature?
        • Is this activity going anywhere else, like Mozilla’s recent “privacy-preserving” advertising?
        • When this does release, what will the default be?
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    • Even_Adder@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      There’s also an option to bring your own LLM, with fields for model name, endpoint, and API token available for entry when the manual option is enabled. However, the page itself warns local models may not work correctly.

      It looks like there’s an option for people to self-host too. You won’t have to send your history to someone else’s computer.

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      • XLE@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        If it’s anything like how they handled the AI sidebar, this option is going to get hidden before it hits production.

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  • TDCN@feddit.dk ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    F*** I really dont want to change away from Firefox. Pleas be good Firefox. Please! Don’t F this up.

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    • Godort@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Librewolf is exactly the same browser with all the security features dialed to 11 and all the AI removed.

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      • Steve@communick.news ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        And it breaks sooo many sites.
        Waterfox, is Firefox that just works.

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      • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        unfortunately forks depend on FF, and chrome to survive.

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    • ilillilillilillililli@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Its too late, bro. You gotta break it off and start mingling with the forks.

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    • redlemace@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      waterfox

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    • aceshigh@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I remember having ff and then switching to chrome because it was better, and then switching back to ff because it was better. This car ride is making me sick.

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  • sturmblast@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Ai in browsers is stupid

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    • markz@suppo.fi ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Companies at every layer are competing, from the OS, to the browser, to the website.

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      • NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Soon your OS will get into a never ending loop with the browser and the website.

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  • arcine@jlai.lu ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Do yourself a favour and use LibreWolf or WaterFox instead.

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    • flying_sheep@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Or just keep using Firefox and don’t use the entirely optional and opt-in features you don’t need. The same as always.

      I’m completely flabbergasted why people get their panties in a twist over

      • completely local features that happen to be backed by machine learning models (the translation feature is a huge privacy win over sending your text to Google translate)
      • opt-in LLM integration that nobody forces you to use
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    • ken@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Or further favourable: Konform Browser

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    • sudoer777@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Floorp is also good since it has PWAs

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      • arcine@jlai.lu ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        But it has a DuMb NaMe so I don’t like it 😡

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    • Puddinghelmet@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      lemmy.ml/c/librewolf

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  • versionc@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I used to enjoy AI a lot, and I still think the technology is really cool, but lately I’m beginning to despise it. It spreads and nestles itself into every corner of our life, and it rots whatever it touches, be it the humans that rely on it or the projects in which it’s used. I see so many open source projects that are tainted with it, it’s almost impossible to avoid it. It’s sad. The generations that will grow up with AI will be fucked.

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    • iglou@programming.dev ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      The generations that will grow up with AI will be fucked.

      Eh. That’s something every single generation before us in at least the past 150 years has been saying about other new society-changing stuff. They’ll be fine, society just changes.

      Generations that will grow up with social media will be fucked. Generations that will grow up with internet will be fucked. Generations that will grow up with video games will be fucked. Generations that will grow up with computers will be fucked. Generations that will grow up with morning-after pills will be fucked. … …

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      • MyRobotShitsBolts@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Looks around at how fucked the world is Maybe they were right?

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      • partofthevoice@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        What about Cambridge Analytica, the mental health impacts, the addiction, … we’re still learning the social impact of social media — especially capitalistic social media. To pretend we aren’t is just plain ignorant, no? You can’t say people are fine when you don’t even know how they’ve been affected.

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      • wolfeh@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Generations that will grow up with morning-after pills will be fucked

        I mean…

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      • Gestrid@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        And at least the first two were right.

        Social media without limit has caused a whole slew of issues that are still being studied. And, while the early days of the internet were great, ever since at least the late 2010s, it’s been largely downhill.

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      • partofthevoice@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Yeah, sorry but I have to disagree with you pretty hard there. Generations that grew up with social media, internet, video games, … they are fucked. We’ve been watching the fuckening for a long time now. Saying that they haven’t been fucked is reminiscent of my grandparents saying ADHD and Anxiety aren’t real.

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      • Reygle@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Funny you say that. In ways not everyone (obviously) doesn’t see, each generation was right about that.

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  • thethunderwolf@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Seeing AI invade open source is sad. AI slop contributions. AI integration that no one asked for.

    For now Firefox derivatives are fine (I use LibreWolf), but many of those derivatives don’t work on macOS because it “fails to verify that this executable is actually executable” (what does that actually mean?????????).

    I had hopes for Ladybird Browser but now it’s being vibe coded (rewritten in rust by ai for no reason whatsoever), and it’s not ready yet anyway. Now I’m hopeful for Servo engine. It’s in development but at some point it will be ready, and it bans slop contributions.

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    • suckdings@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      For now Firefox derivatives are fine (I use LibreWolf), but many of those derivatives don’t work on macOS because it “fails to verify that this executable is actually executable” (what does that actually mean???)

      Not sure if this is what you’re experiencing, but it’s a common thing. Happens to me too, I have to run a command after I update from Homebrew.

      LibreWolf FAQ: why is LibreWolf marked as broken?

      It is possible that Apple Silicon users see their recently downloaded LibreWolf flagged as broken or unsafe by the OS.

      This happens because we do not notarize the macOS version of the browser: we don’t have a paid Apple Developer license and we don’t want to support this signing mechanism that is put behind a paywall without providing significant gains.

      You can remove the quarantine attribute from the Application using this command:

      xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/LibreWolf.app
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  • DarkSideOfTheMoon@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    So sad for Firefox. I try to keep using since it’s the only solution free of Chromium, but I guess chromium will control everything only Safari will not be chromium.

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    • Squizzy@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Librefox, waterwolf, mullvad, fennec?

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    • potustheplant@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Hopefully Ladybird will be prpduction ready at some point.

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      • BennyTheExplorer@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Ladybird is pretty much dead to me, firstly because the dev has some really bad right wing vibes (he said gender inclusive language is too political for his docs and retweeted a Nazi on Twitter). And secondly because the started using AI to move the code to Rust to make it more secure, which is insane if you know anything about AI or security.

        My current hope is in servo, because they have much more capable maintainers and the project seems to make some good progress. Also they have daily builds on their website for every operating system, so you can already try it out easily (but don’t expect everything to work right now, they still need some time).

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      • thethunderwolf@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Ladybird is being rewritten in Rust by AI for no reason whatsoever. Browsers should be secure, and vibe coding prevents security.

        Currently I am hopeful for Servo. Its development is not as far along, but it seems way saner. It bans AI contribution, and it’s intended to be very performant.

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  • CosmoNova@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Much like Adobe‘s Acrobat which I also have to use for work. At least from what I can tell when it suddenly summarizes a PDF. There‘s no way in hell that happens locally. But the fact that it seemingly automatically processes potentially sensitive data from customers didn‘t even do as little as raising eyebrows when I brought it up.

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    • mrgoosmoos@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I use Firefox as a PDF reader at work. it’s better than Adobe Reader or Chrome, and it’s good enough, so I haven’t bothered finding something else.

      I deal with secure information sometimes, in PDF form. I haven’t even considered that this information might not remain local.

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      • lemming741@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        Sumatra is the notepad++ of pdf readers (minus the state sponsored hackers notepad-plus-plus.org/…/hijacked-incident-info-up…)

        github.com/sumatrapdfreader/sumatrapdf

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      • thethunderwolf@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        I use KDE’s PDF reader Okular

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    • jbloggs777@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      If your company has an enterprise/privacy agreement with Adobe, it might be considered addressed, similar to the millions of companies using Microsoft 365 and Sharepoint.

      If, OTOH, it’s a “free” feature of Adobe, it could be eating your company’s data without constraints.

      If the latter, let us know your company’s name so that we can avoid it.

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    • Analog@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      No way in hell? My understanding is that an NPU could perform that type of processing locally. I welcome info & correction!

      (I know other types of local ai processors could too, but there’s little chance Acrobat would be geared to look for them - even GPUs - unlike NPUs.)

      Now if we switch to talking about policy instead of capability, I don’t think Adobe would miss a chance to be evil. So yeah they’re probably stealing all the data they possibly can.

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      • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        few computers have an embedded NPU

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  • tackleberry@thelemmy.club ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    You should see how AI is being deployed in warfare. Plausible deniability is about to go through the roof.

    Back in the day, you get out jail free card was on a scale of “the devil made me do it” to “I was following orders”, now we get “It was AI”

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    • Typhoon@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      You should see how AI is being deployed in warfare. Plausible deniability is about to go through the roof.

      newsweek.com/ai-chooses-nuclear-option-in-95-of-w…

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      • tackleberry@thelemmy.club ⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        you know what? I think we should all start dropping nuclear bobs so we can become desensitized to nuclear warfare the same way we have become desensitized to genocides and pedophilia.

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  • mintiefresh@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Waterfox. Librewolf. Zen. Floorp.

    They’re all good options in their own ways. Just pick one and go

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    • callyral@pawb.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Have you seen the better browsing experience? It’s on Zen. It’s literally on Librewolf. It’s on Floorp without ads. It’s literally on Waterfox. You can probably find it on Ironfox. Dude it’s on Ladybird. It’s a Servo original. It’s on GNOME Web. You can browse on GNOME Web. You can go to GNOME Web and browse it. Epiphany has it for you. </joke>

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      • SpaceCadet@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        What’s the original of this copypasta?

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    • bilb@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Floorp (which I use) does not distinguish itself from Firefox with regards to AI features, so if those features existing is a problem for you it’s not an option either.

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  • solrize@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    They can’t help themselves.

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  • dorumon@lemmy.cafe ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    So I feel violated and gross and I never wanna use Firefox again. I don’t care if you can self host it. I don’t care if it’s private. Mozilla propagandists need to fucking understand that their privacy policy does not reassure me. Nor does the fact that they went back on the AI kill switch and sent my information that should’ve been private to someone else’s computer a good thing. It is fucking bad and I hope Mozilla fucking implodes. In the rise of fascist governments and the need for privacy. This is unacceptable and I refuse to even use a third party fork of Firefox. The best feature arguably that made Firefox worth while that being syncing has been basically weaponized potentially into something evil that will be used against people. Especially as they have long since updated their policies to make sure law enforcement can gain access to your personal information anyway.

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    • Blisterexe@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Nor does the fact that they went back on the AI kill switch and sent my information that should’ve been private to someone else’s computer a good thing.

      when did they do that?

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  • Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    No thanks.

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  • TheSeveralJourneysOfReemus@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Most pointed questions you type will start a Google search1. This loads a regular search results page, and sees Firefox’s AI chatbot shift to a sidebar on the right. The AI reads the top results (including any AI overview), and produces a response based on them.

    AI reads AI reading AI reading AI reading AI reading…

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    • harsh3466@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Exactly what I thought when I got to that bit of the article.

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    • kilgore_trout@feddit.it ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      What could go wrong.

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  • mimavox@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    One would think they’d be extra careful not to piss the users off at this point… but no.

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  • Kazel@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    🤢 🤮

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  • mikedd@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    This is getting so sad and pathetic that it’s getting really funny 😅

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  • sudoer777@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    OpenCode with Playwright gives you full control over what model you use, the prompts, and what it integrates with, and it promotes open weight models. The way Firefox implements this seems gimmicky.

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  • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    bUt ThErE’s A kiLL SwItCh!

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    • darkangelazuarl@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Yrah, Its called uninstalling Firefox

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      • douglasg14b@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

        And instead install a chromium based browser, right?

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  • maplesaga@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I use Duck.AI a lot, and it says its privacy oriented. Is Firefox doing anything similar, or is it all monetized data?

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  • senna@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Just let them shoot themselves in the foot. Get familiar with the forks. Someone at Mozilla has no idea what they’re doing. You would think they would learn their lesson last AI garbage but I guess not.

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  • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    The geo-exfiltration of personal information needs to be in great big banner lights; and not just because you’re outside America, or China, or wherever the bot happens to be where Firefox is exfitrating your history as queries.

    Exfil is bad; geo-exfiltration is next-level bad.

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  • Dultas@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Guess I need to self host sync now as I don’t trust Mozilla with any of my data at this point.

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  • phoenixz@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Mozilla is still being paid by Google so they can continue to exist and make sure Google won’t be sued for monopoly behaviors, is it not?

    If so, is it fair to assume that Google is just paying them to piss off the user base so that everyone will use chrome anyways?

    If not, them why the fuck has Mozilla been doing everything to be hostile to it’s users, for years now?

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  • pirate2377@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Mozilla try not to anger their user base with their new features challenge (impossible)

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  • Zen_Shinobi@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    You can opt out in the settings

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  • Mulligrubs@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    10 delete AI 20 goto line 10

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  • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Yesterday I was nicely prompted to accept their ToS to continue using their service.
    No mention if it was FF Relay, Mozilla acc or just Firefox.
    Because I didnt want to blindly accept anything I went into the about:config page and disabled the banner.

    Honestly: Fuck that.

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