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STOCKHOLM, Sept 25 (Reuters) - Vienna-based advocacy group NOYB on Wednesday said it has filed a complaint with the Austrian data protection authority against Mozilla accusing the Firefox browser maker of tracking user behaviour on websites without consent.

NOYB (None Of Your Business), the digital rights group founded by privacy activist Max Schrems, said Mozilla has enabled a so-called “privacy preserving attribution” feature that turned the browser into a tracking tool for websites without directly telling its users.

Mozilla had defended the feature, saying it wanted to help websites understand how their ads perform without collecting data about individual people. By offering what it called a non-invasive alternative to cross-site tracking, it hoped to significantly reduce collecting individual information.

  • dr-robot@fedia.io
    1510·
    4 hours ago

    Turning the feature on by default is bad, but I don’t think that legal complaints are the way to go as well as the aggressive tone of NOYB. Firefox is the only browser developed and maintained professionally which has the potential of offering some privacy on the web. Given the importance of web browsers volunteer work just won’t cut it with the amount of features and security concerns that a browser needs.

    NOYB would’ve done much better by talking to Mozilla directly and advocating for them to do the right thing going for a legal complaint as the final nuclear option. If the was the case, then good that there’s a complaint, but the article does not indicate the any of this happened.

    • Hirom@beehaw.org
      51·
      2 hours ago

      NOYB has the right to send a complaint if it think a company infringe upon right to privacy. Mozilla isn’t entitled to special treatment or special notice before filling a complaint.

      Mozilla should have expected this. They claim to defend users privacy so they should understand why consent for data collection is important. Also there was public outcry and criticism of opt-out, and yet they haven’t backed down.

      If Mozilla resolve these issues, NOYB could ask for the complaint to be dropped. I hope they do resolve this, and do drop the complaint.

      • ReversalHatchery@beehaw.orgEnglish
        2·
        23 minutes ago

        there is this approach where if the neighbor is loud, you first try to speak with them, and if they don’t care then you go to the police. have you heard of it?

    • zecg@lemmy.world
      1014·
      4 hours ago

      talking to Mozilla directly and advocating for them to do the right thing going for a legal complaint as the final nuclear option

      Fuck that, they know what they’re doing and they know what the right thing is. Mozilla is the enemy for some time now, Firefox’s development is basically held hostage by a shitty corporation and a toothless foundation.