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Firefox now has Terms of Use! This'll go over like a lead balloon.
You give Mozilla all rights necessary to operate Firefox, including processing data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice, as well as acting on your behalf to help you navigate the internet. When you upload or input information through Firefox, you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox.
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/about/legal/terms/firefox/
Update: See below in the thread for their clarification.
This clause explicitly separates the information they claim license over from the data collected in the Privacy Notice. This clause is more expansive—"information uploaded through Firefox" is basically anything in a HTTP request or a websocket.
This is the press release. I do not believe there is concord between this language and the actual policy: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/products/firefox/firefox-news/firefox-terms-of-use/
Hey FWIW, Vivaldi does not have anything like this language: https://vivaldi.com/privacy/vivaldi-end-user-license-agreement/
I have spent my night reading browser Terms and Privacy Policies. Why? Because I love you and hate myself, apparently.
So here's the deal: that "non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license" you're granting to Firefox/Moz when you upload data through it? It is boilerplate language. Pretty common actually!
But not in browsers. In fact, not a single browser ToS has anything resembling this provision.
Know what does?
I wonder why Mozilla would want to use the same language those platforms do.
Mozilla has updated their press release with the following clarification:
UPDATE: We’ve seen a little confusion about the language regarding licenses, so we want to clear that up. We need a license to allow us to make some of the basic functionality of Firefox possible. Without it, we couldn’t use information type into Firefox, for example. It does NOT give us ownership of your data or a right to use it for anything other than what is described in the Privacy Notice.
https://blog.mozilla.org/en/products/firefox/firefox-news/firefox-terms-of-use/
That is good to hear, but their reasoning makes no sense given that no other browser uses that language.
@mttaggart ... yeah, we don't want Mozilla to use information that we type into Firefox? that's our entire objection
@ireneista Many have suggested that the intended meaning here is something like "We literally need to license your data to transmit it via HTTP," but this feels off to me, given that no other browser's Terms contain this language. I'd be interested in your thoughts on that.
@mttaggart @ireneista Mozilla the company is not transmitting the data. It provides the means to do so to me. -I- cause my data to be transmitted.
That's like saying Bosch heats my water for me, or Citroen drives me to work.
@http_error_418 @mttaggart that's under the present implementation. the normal way to roll out features that require legal changes is to do the paperwork first, and only then deploy the feature. so we're left only speculating about what future changes might bring, once the company has the right to do that........
@ireneista @mttaggart well yeah, that's why I'm busy switching browser
@http_error_418 @ireneista So, having done a fairly exhaustive review of browser terms, I can tell you that this language is rare. But when it's present, such as in Arc's terms, it is explicit about the use of your data in transmission, and that's it. Arc is also notable—perhaps because it is an AI product—for starting its Privacy Policy with statements about what it will not collect from you. Firefox's policy, sadly, makes no such definitive claims.
@http_error_418 @mttaggart ah :/ yeah. sorry. wish we had something more comforting to say about it...