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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.
@mttaggart not seeing what’s objectionable about the quoted section
@copiesofcopies If I upload my artwork to anywhere via Firefox, have I just granted a royalty-free license to that intellectual property to Firefox, if they deem use of it is in my best interest in "interacting with online content?"
@mttaggart as I read it, you give them a limited license to use that content as needed to do what you’re using Firefox to do. I.e. if you’re uploading an image to a website, you authorize them to do so as you directed.
@copiesofcopies @mttaggart But they are not doing it. Your computer, directed by you, running free and open source software that just happens to be published by them, is what's uploading. They are not party to that transaction. And their incompetent and/or malicious legal department doesn't understand that, or wants to pretend they are for nefarious purposes.
@dalias @mttaggart GDPR Art. 4: “‘controller’ means the natural or legal person, public authority, agency or other body which, alone or jointly with others, determines the purposes and means of the processing of personal data….” App publishers are (imo reasonably) interpreting this to apply to apps that deal with personal info, because the app developer arguably “determines the purposes and means of the processing.”
@copiesofcopies @mttaggart I don't think this is reasonable unless you're publishing an "app" not an application - that is, something that's giving you access to the user's device rather than operating entirely at the direction of the user.
@dalias @mttaggart that’s really not relevant to the text of the regulation.
@copiesofcopies @mttaggart Are you trying to claim that authors of FOSS are data controllers for any data the user enters with the software they made? In the absence of any channel of control? Or only that something particular Mozilla has done makes that so?
@dalias @mttaggart I’m saying the text of the GDPR is intentionally broad and could be read that way by regulators. Mozilla has more potential exposure than an average FOSS developer, which may be why they’re taking a conservative approach to that risk.
@copiesofcopies @mttaggart I guess that's plausible, but I see it as incompetence: rather than reducing exposure, it's made them a more likely target for regulators by claiming entitlement to access something they clearly have no right to, and without the necessary GDPR means to opt out.
@dalias @copiesofcopies @mttaggart
Whatever legal language may or may not give cover, the *spirit* of GDPR is to say precisely what information you collect and for what reason, and if you do not have a good reason, do not collect. Not "use everything everywhere for anything" just in case.