Bonum Certa Men Certa

Mozilla Responds to Controversy Over Embedded Ads in Firefox

Summary: Mozilla uses the yuppie-Nuremberg defense to justify selling away users' privacy

Mozilla is a company with plenty of good people -- good as in ethical. There are great new browsers coming out [1] (latest release at start of the month) and plans for even better [2] and accelerated browsers [3], not to mention powerful derivatives [4] that often come installed by default in GNU/Linux distributions. The recent decision to embed ads in Firefox was therefore a bit baffling and definitely surprising. Mozilla's official account in Twitter responded to us, taking note of a formal statement from the management (Mitchell Baker [5]) -- a statement later cited by some sites [6,7]. There is an online debate about Mozilla's policy [8,9] after some revealing bias (against ads) even from sites that bombard visitors with ads [10] (sometimes Microsoft ads around GNU/Linux stories).

After reading the response from Mitchell Baker we remain unconvinced that lipstick can be put on the pig. It's the yuppie-nuremberg defense. There is nothing wrong with making money, but the question is how. Moreover, one's need for money does not justify an immoral act. Mozilla helps surveillance on Firefox users. It's hardly even triggered by keystrokes and a trigger action (Chrome is no better in that regard). In the next post we are going to deal with Chrome, which is even worse than Mozilla when it comes to privacy. We recommend Rekonq or some Firefox derivatives like GNU IceCat and Debian's IceWeasel.

Related/contextual items from the news:



  1. Firefox 27: Faster, more secure and more social


  2. Mozilla Debuts New Australis Interface for Firefox 29 Aurora Browsers
    Mozilla is making a new interface available to users of its open-source Firefox Web browser as an alpha release. Firefox is developed in multiple branches—the mainline release, beta, Aurora (alpha) and Nightly branches. Until Friday, Feb. 7, the new Firefox Australis interface was only available in a Nightly branch for Firefox and has now moved into the alpha phase for what will become Firefox 29. The Firefox 29 Aurora release came in the same week as the mainline Firefox 27 browser debuted, providing users with fixes for 13 security advisories. The new Australis user interface in the Firefox 29 Aurora release has been making the rounds in the Firefox Nightly release channel since at least August 2013.


  3. Mozilla's Use Of GPUs For 2D Acceleration
    Bas Schouten of Mozilla presented at FOSDEM earlier this month about their use of graphics processors for accelerating 2D content on the web. Unfortunately no slides from the presentation have yet to widely surface, but as of this week there's now a YouTube video (embedded below) for those interested in Mozilla's use of GPUs for 2D content and the pros and cons they have experienced thus far.


  4. SeaMonkey - More than a Web Browser
    I actually first discovered SeaMonkey many years ago when trying out the many versions of Puppy Linux, where SeaMonkey was sometimes included as the default "web browser". Of course, if I had actually paid enough attention, I would have realised it was labeled as an "all-in-one internet application suite". But nevertheless, it looked and behaved like Firefox so I assumed it was just an off-shoot of that software.


  5. Content, Ads, Caution
    In the early days of Firefox we were very careful not to offer content to our users. Firefox came out of a world in which both Netscape/AOL (the alma mater of many early Mozillians) and Microsoft had valued their content and revenue sources over the user experience. Those of us from Netscape/AOL had seen features, bookmarks, tabs, and other irritants added to the product to generate revenue. We’d seen Mozilla code subsequently “enhanced” with these features.


  6. Mozilla clarifies, defends Firefox ad position
    Mitchell Baker, chair of the Mozilla Foundation, defends Firefox's new ad program. Firefox users remain wary.


  7. Mozilla's Mitchell Baker Gets Crystal Clear on Ads Headed for Firefox
    Just this week, Mozilla appeared to buckle under the weight of the Internet Advertising Bureau's wishes as the company delivered an announcement that it is going to put "Directory Tiles" in front of Firefox users, which sound a lot like ads. Now, Mozilla's Mitchell Baker has weighed in officially on the topic of ads in Firefox, and her response is worth a read.


  8. Is Mozilla Selling Ads in Firefox?


  9. Why ads in Firefox are no big deal


  10. Mozilla To Begin Pushing Ads To The New Tabs Page
  11. Mozilla To Sell Ads In Firefox Web Browser
    Wait, what? Mozilla made itself the villian of the online ad business early last year by announcing that the latest version of Firefox would block third-party ad technologies by default, a move the Interactive Advertising Bureau's top lobbyist called "a nuclear strike" on the industry.




Recent Techrights' Posts

Links 01/06/2025: Bird Flu, Food Price Inflation, and Growing US-China Hostilities
Links for the day
Links 01/06/2025: "Vibe Coding" Turns Out to be a Fraud and Amazon Merits Boycott, Argue Bloggers
Links for the day
Gemini Links 01/06/2025: "Stardust" and Ideal PC Setup
Links for the day
Links 01/06/2025: Windows TCO, Openwashing, "It's FOSS" Still Promoting Microsoft
Links for the day
Gemini Links 01/06/2025: Simplification and Networks Everywhere
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, May 31, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, May 31, 2025
Google Bribes EFF. EFF Promotes LLM Slop as 'Fair Use'. To GAFAM It's a Low-Cost Lobby Hedge.
So the bribes pay off ("slush fund") and the word spreads
Slopwatch: Fake Text and Images, Financial Bubbles, and Scams in "Intelligent" Clothing
Sometimes what they mean by "AI" is just cheap labour somewhere else, as we discussed in IRC a few hours ago
Why Microsoft is Collapsing (Similar to What's Happening at IBM), As Insiders See It
IBM seems like one heck of a mess
Reliable Computing Means Free (Libre) Computing
Sites that want to promote security ought to deal with the biggest issues
Links 31/05/2025: US Court Orders Sides With RFE/RL, War Updates From Ukraine
Links for the day
Gemini Links 31/05/2025: ARM Server and power_supply Subsystem
Links for the day
Links 31/05/2025: Slop Stigmatised as Disinformation, Catalyst/Driver of "Death of Communication"
Links for the day
Common Sense 101: Do Not Write Blog Posts Saying You Want to Murder Colleagues (or Yourself)
Only crazy people would think stabbings are a joke
Microsoft Bankruptcy
"Microsoft unit in Russia to file for bankruptcy, database shows"
Techrights Does Not Compete With LLM Slop, It Exposes the Bastards, Plagiarists and Scammers Who Do That
People like Scam Altman, still facing a lawsuit from his own sister for sexual abuse against her
Links 31/05/2025: Microsoft-Connected Builder.ai is a Fraud and US is Purging Students Based on Race/Nationality
Links for the day
Gemini Links 30/05/2025: Limmat, Doomscrollers, and Arguments Parsing
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, May 30, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, May 30, 2025
The "AI" (Slop) Bubble Already Popped, But It's Not an Overnight Collapse
where Microsoft put its money
No More Steven Astorino at IBM, Chatter About Weekly/Nonstop Layoffs at IBM
What happened? Good luck guessing.
Looking at Corruption in Europe, Going Beyond the EPO
Expect a new series to kick off very soon
Slopwatch: Security SPAM and LLM Slop for SEO and FUD Purposes, Perpetually Tarnishing the Perception of Linux and (Open)SSH Security
A lot of this Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD) comes from Microsoft and its LLMs
Links 30/05/2025: Google's LLM Slop Pushers Are Killing Journalism and Shira Perlmutter Fails to Stop Bribed Regime From Legalising Plagiarism (in "AI" Clothing)
Links for the day
Links 30/05/2025: Offline Arts and "Threshold of Patience"
Links for the day
Signing Off Serious Lies With a Statement of Truth is No Joking Matter
It's not hard to see what's happening here
Links 30/05/2025: LLM Slop Already Ingests and Vomits Its Own Garbage, Facebook Exec Admits Copyrights a Concern Too
Links for the day
Mass Layoffs at Microsoft Result in More Whistleblowers From Microsoft
Microsoft's predatory pricing is further
Slopwatch: Planet Ubuntu Became LLM Slop and Some People Fail to See the Immorality of Plagiarism
it lessens the incentive for people to publish real articles
EPO Poll: 68% Dissatisfied With Quality of Slop (Wrongly Framed as "AI") for Patent Classification
Slop does not work, it's just falsely advertised with extra hype (funded by slop pushers that sponsor the major media)
Big Crowds Gather to Learn About Software Freedom From the Man Who Started GNU/Linux in 1983
"It was a great success"
Microsoft Layoffs Again in Bay Area
Microsoft relies on people's false belief that being "in LinkedIn" will get you a job; well, seems like even working inside LinkedIn really sucks and you lose the job
Gemini Links 30/05/2025: Fighting Against the Bad News, and Slop is Dehumanisation Disguised as "Intelligence"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, May 29, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, May 29, 2025