{"id":12517,"date":"2020-03-12T08:30:21","date_gmt":"2020-03-12T15:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/?p=12517"},"modified":"2021-07-26T09:32:06","modified_gmt":"2021-07-26T16:32:06","slug":"mozilla-does-not-respect-user-requests-to-stop-tracking-telemetry-data","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.privateinternetaccess.com\/blog\/mozilla-does-not-respect-user-requests-to-stop-tracking-telemetry-data\/","title":{"rendered":"Mozilla does not respect user requests to stop tracking telemetry data"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Firefox system add-on called telemetry-coverage may still be sending your IP address data to Mozilla even if you explicitly turn off telemetry data \u2013 which has privacy implications most people aren\u2019t aware of as Mozilla stores telemetry data with a unique identifier<\/a> tied to your specific Firefox client. All Firefox clients come with preinstalled system add-ons that function just like add-ons that a user would install themselves from the Add-ons store, except they\u2019re there by default. A Mozilla employee commented on the SuperUser<\/a> forum attempting to defend this action:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is true that we\u2019re now releasing some features internally as something we call \u201cSystem Extension\u201d, which technically is the same as an addon you could install on addons.mozilla.org, with the difference that these come pre-installed with Firefox and there is no way to disable them. We mainly do this to be able to ship updates faster, but it\u2019s also nice that we have some features totally separated, which makes the development process easier for us!\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Since 2018, Firefox has come up with a way to use a system add-on called telemetry-coverage to estimate the \u201cunknown portion of our users [that] do not report telemetry for a variety of reasons.\u201d Mozilla claimed that there are two types of Firefox configurations that end up with telemetry disabled: some enterprise installations, and when a user manually goes in and disables telemetry. Mozilla stated in their blog post<\/a> announcing their new way of measuring their telemetry coverage:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe the large majority of clients do send telemetry but currently have no way of measuring this.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mozilla doesn\u2019t need telemetry-coverage to understand their telemetry coverage \u2013 so why is it installed?<\/h2>\n

Why does Firefox even need to know what percentage of Windows users or Mac users or Linux users prefer telemetry off? As an explanation, Mozilla claims that \u201cwe need better insight into our opt-out rates for telemetry\u201d to \u201censure new features improve your user experience and to guide Mozilla\u2019s business decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

This reasoning flies in the face of logic. By default, Mozilla is able to measure the amount of people that manually go in and disable telemetry. Sure they may not be able to tell how many Firefox clients are being fired up by corporate entities and those clients won\u2019t be able to have a say in what features come and go \u2013 but that\u2019s clearly a tradeoff those enterprise users and especially the ones who manually turn off telemetry are willing to make.<\/p>\n

The telemetry data provided by those that don\u2019t care they are providing telemetry data or don\u2019t know they\u2019re providing telemetry data is more than enough data for Mozilla to gauge if new features improve the user experience. They already have the data to see if new updates and features increase bug reports \u2013 so the real reason isn\u2019t that. The real reason Mozilla is so keen on having telemetry data that they run a study and install an unremovable add-on for those that have disabled telemetry the way they\u2019re allowed to must be the latter reason: to guide Mozilla\u2019s business decisions.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s entirely possible and dare I say likely that the business decision here is to try and get that telemetry data because the government often wants that telemetry data and will try to make Mozilla\u2019s business very hard unless they work to provide it.<\/p>\n

Didn\u2019t I opt out of Firefox studies when turning off telemetry?<\/h2>\n

When turning off telemetry in Firefox\u2019s privacy preferences (about:preferences#privacy) you need to uncheck the following three boxes:<\/p>\n