An Update on our Terms of Use

[AshleyT]

On Wednesday we shared that we’re introducing a new Terms of Use (TOU) and Privacy Notice for Firefox. Since then, we’ve been listening to some of our community’s concerns with parts of the TOU, specifically about licensing. Our intent was just to be as clear as possible about how we make Firefox work, but in doing so we also created some confusion and concern. With that in mind, we’re updating the language to more clearly reflect the limited scope of how Mozilla interacts with user data.

Here’s what the new language will say:

You give Mozilla the rights necessary to operate Firefox. This includes processing your data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice. It also includes a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license for the purpose of doing as you request with the content you input in Firefox. This does not give Mozilla any ownership in that content. 

In addition, we’ve removed the reference to the Acceptable Use Policy because it seems to be causing more confusion than clarity.

Privacy FAQ

We also updated our Privacy FAQ to better address legal minutia around terms like “sells.” While we’re not reverting the FAQ, we want to provide more detail about why we made the change in the first place. Check out the full blog post to read more.

[Haagee]

You give Mozilla the rights necessary to operate Firefox. This includes processing your data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice. It also includes a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license for the purpose of doing as you request with the content you input in Firefox. This does not give Mozilla any ownership in that content. 

-You give Mozilla the rights necessary to operate Firefox.  -  It's the Terms of Use. You have to actually spell out which specific rights people give up when using the software. I don't know which corporate lawyer ever considered four sentences leaning on "the rights necessary to operate Firefox" as specific enough to hold up in court.

-This includes processing your data as we describe in the Firefox Privacy Notice.  -  Now we're getting somewhere. Where the first line can be scrapped entirely, this actually spells out that Mozilla has the right to process our data as described in the Privacy Notice. This is boiler plate stuff, makes perfect sense to be in any TOS. The Privacy Notice itself includes some very disturbing sections about advertising, sponsored content and sharing data with third parties, but that's for another post.

-It also includes a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license for the purpose of doing as you request with the content you input in Firefox. -  Terrible wording. Way too short, way too non-specific. This is shooting yourself in the foot for when these terms ever touch a courtroom. Worldwide, royalty-free and nonexclusive are at least in the right ball-park, that is how you would describe the kind of license that you seem to be aiming for. But you're missing about 90% of the needed specifiers for this to hold up. What content? For how long? Is it perpetual? Can it be revoked? What actions can Mozilla take with it? How does this intersect with local laws? How is legally restricted input handled? This is normally six paragraphs of legalese, for licensing digital content that is a lot less sensitive that what you're hitting here. A single-sentence claim to a license, for every single thing a user inputs, for a global digital service - this is legal insanity. Not to mention that "for the purpose" is the legal qualifier for stating why you initially want this license, and not what you would use to restrict your use for any purposes outside of it. Although the cynic in me is starting to think that you already know that.

-This does not give Mozilla any ownership in that content.  -  Now that was already self-evident, nothing in these terms even hints at claiming ownership. So I assume that this is meant to catch legal laypeople, who may be been misinterpreting the sentences before it as a claim to ownership. Turning down the legalese, going back to regular English to clear something up for regular users. Which I would normally commend, but guess what - there is confusion about the legalese, because the legalese doesn't do what is required. Get this sentence out of there, fix the actual section before it. This is not just unclear to laypeople. This is too unclear to function as terms of service.

[Llammissar]

Okay, so the promise about Firefox never selling my personal data is going back into the FAQ, right?

[spipau]

I am a Firefox user and promoter since 15 years and I just installed an alternative for the first time. You finally lost track of your mission and you will go down if you go through with this. A sad day for privacy…

[FredJupiter]

Apparently, the Mozilla organizations came to the conclusion that these data policy changes were minor and could easily fly under the radar. Our companies' will remove Firefox completely by March 15th from each and every workstation if the change is not revoked. Thanks to AshleyT to at least reporting the violation.

[thisisausername]

Switched to LibreWolf, Staying there for the future! FOREVER

[seva]

Mozilla is seeing a spike in Firefox usage right now, as users migrate their data, and Mozilla thinks, "Wow, this is the Streisand effect, we did something stupid, and we've got more users!!!"

And when a Mozilla employee goes to his boss and says, "Can we explain the legal language?", the boss replies, "Are you crazy? We've got more Firefox usage now, we need even more vague legal language and even more sales of user data!!!"

In a few weeks, users will migrate their data, and Firefox usage will start to decline. If this decline is rapid, for example, reaching 10%, Mozilla will start explaining the legal language, trying to prevent the decline. However, this will not do much, because a person who has completely switched to a new browser uses a new browser and does not need to return to Firefox. Especially in the context of Mozilla continuing to lie and not admitting to selling user data to third parties.

I also think Mozilla will call the sale of user data some phrase that managers have invented, such as "privacy assurance". For example, selling data to Facebook will be called "privacy assurance with Facebook". And selling data to Microsoft will be called "privacy assurance with Microsoft". And in some time Mozilla will publish a big article on the blog called "Mozilla Know-How: Privacy Assurance in Working with Partners". The article will tell how Mozilla increased the management apparatus by 83%, and how this management apparatus contributed to an increase in privacy by 38% in the process of "privacy assurance" in working with partners.

[tetryonx]

Unfortunately, I am in the process of uninstalling Firefox and migrating my household due to these changes. Whoever decided these changes should be let go because they clearly didn't think of the ramifications of removing a privacy guarantee with a loud and vocal community.