OUTDATED⚠️
Mozilla bought the Android email app K-9 (which didn’t include any trackers) and integrated trackers as part of #Mozilla‘s rebranding under the #Thunderbird name.
They even made it opt-out instead of opt-in. Their defense for breaking the law: ”we wouldn’t have enough data if we obeyed the law.“
It doesn’t matter whether you ”anonymized“ the data or not: If you want to extract data from someone’s device to yours, you may do so only if they knowingly consented.
https://sigmoid.social/@davidculley/113428366130956936
@davidculley Update: the product manager for #Thunderbird has replied in the Github issue thread, and committed to making the telemetry opt-in instead, without use of dark pattern.
@joepie91 @davidculley maybe it's just me, but the way the PM writes gives me the creeps.
@joepie91 @davidculley really does not sound like a person who is on eye-level based on the amount of corpo-speak
@Profpatsch I mean, it's definitely corpo-speak, but for me personally what matters is whether someone is open to making concrete commitments - usually the answer is "no", but I was pleasantly surprised in this case :)
@joepie91 Thing is with these kinds of people you never know whether they are just saying things to placate …
@Profpatsch IME that's unlikely to be the case when there's a concrete commitment. Like, nothing is impossible, but usually the way that this sort of thing works is that someone makes a pseudo-commitment as a PR move, without the intention of ever doing what it implies, and then later tries to retroactively justify it (to others *and* to themselves, ethically) by saying "well what we're doing still technically fits in the description" even though it's not what anybody meant.
That's why I asked for very concrete commitments here, that are difficult to weasel out of; if they unambiguously say yes to that, it's unlikely they are looking to weasel out of it, because then they would've given a much more evasive answer. And with the concrete commitment, if they change their mind, they would have to openly admit to not following their promises in a way that can't really be justified.
TL;DR if someone clearly promises something, you can hold them to it, and that in and of itself discourages changes without a very good reason.
@Profpatsch (Sidenote, all of this is from a background of "for some people this is just how they talk and/or how they are expected to, in their role, and I don't want to assume dishonesty unless I actually see it" - it's not so much relevant if your general preference is to stay away from people who come across like that in general)