by userbinator
14 subcomments
- As a Firefox user: if I want a VPN I'll use an actual VPN. Focus on making a great browser, and not all this distraction.
Also, "free": "If you're not paying for it, you're the product being sold"
- I often use Opera browser's free proxy they offer for basic browsing or blocked sites. They advertise it as a free VPN but it's merely a proxy. As far as I know, it's unlimited traffic and you can choose the region it connects to.
Edge also has some Microsoft VPN with a very small amount of bandwidth for the free tier.
I'm fine with this kind of stuff as long as people are aware it doesn't offer the same connectivity as a full paid VPN.
by notepad0x90
2 subcomments
- I usually defend Mozilla with these things, but I'm a bit bearish on this. It's not like they're not relying on big partnerships already for their survival. I don't have a problem with free to long as there is a paid plan, which I don't see on their announcement page. I don't care who is running a free-only VPN is a huge red flag, and I am one of those people that recommends using VPN services instead of running your thing on a VPS or something.
What worries me is this will get adoption and they're start talking about profiting from it via "differential privacy"
Or, even worse for the web is a more realistic problem: Firefox is notoriously hard to manage in an enterprise fleet. Their biggest hurdle to marketshare is just that, chrome works well with windows, linux and mac a like and lends itself to management. I'm frequently fighting to be allowed to use Firefox already personally. This poses a direct threat to enterprise security policies. Anyone who bans random free vpns in their networks, now has to include Firefox to that list. And I don't need to mention how bad that is for the web given Google will effectively be the gatekeeper of the entire internet, even the tiny marketshare Mozilla has will be crushed. I wonder if in retrospect, this seemingly mundane feature would be the death-blow to the only alternative browser ecosystem.
- I self-host wireguard on a VPS for this exact reason. $5/mo and i know exactly what's running. the setup takes some effort but after that it's basically zero maintenance.
The bigger issue with browser VPNs for me is that they don't help against DPI at all. I'm in a country where the ISP fingerprints wireguard traffic and drops it - a browser VPN connecting to a known mullvad endpoint gets blocked just as fast. You need protocol-level obfuscation for that, which is a completely different problem.
by pidgeon_lover
0 subcomment
- I love the smell of bloatware in the morning
- You know what would be actually cool and a transformative improvement? Mozilla to make an iOS port of Firefox and publish it in regions where Apple has been forced to allow it.
by looopTools
5 subcomments
- As I understand it, it is just like in Opera. So a proxy not a VPN. I honestly find it distasteful that they may call it a VPN without it actually being one.
- Why are they trying to sell a VPN in the countries where users barely need it?
- > the free tier will initially provide 50GB of monthly data
Is it per machine or profile or ip address or something else?
I switch from Firefox to Brave a few months ago because the markdown in aistudio.google.com is not displayed correctly in Firefox. I wonder if anybody has the same issue or that issue can be fixed.
- Free VPN's are usually funded by agreeing to route some VPN traffic for other people though your own network. They basically work as mixers, randomizing traffic throughout the VPN population.
This can expose users to legal risks, but but can also add plausible deniability at the same time "it wasn't me, it was someone on VPN".
by ChrisArchitect
0 subcomment
- Source: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/firefox-148-149-new-feat... (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47415420)
- Do they name the service provider of this VPN or how it works? The official announcement is just as sparse on the details.
- Firefox doing everything, but being a good browser.
- Who will be the first to write an extension (or utility) that allows this to be used as a general system proxy not limited to Firefox?
- I'm sure the UK government (which is against VPNs because they help people circumvent their Online Safety Act) will love them.
- Will our data be routed to Israel like every other vpn is required to do?
- This looks like it's just a traffic proxy, and isn't actually a full VPN.
- The ability to nest proxy servers using TLS would be sufficient for me.
by shevy-java
0 subcomment
- That's useful, or? Does that work in all countries?
- Where's the money for this VPN going to come from? The ads they insert into my home page or the CEO's inflated compensation?
- There's an oft repeated claim about "Modern Browsers are some of the most complex projects"
Yeah no shit, when you have browser vendors shipping features that have no place in browser, it's hardly surprising.
Why does a browser need screen sharing built in? Why does it need a vpn client?
You know there's a fucking operating system running under the browser that can run those things without worrying about how they impact on a fucking browser, right?
- These "official" privacy features tend to end up being hollow masquerades when the providers inevitably capitulate to other corporations and authoritarian countries.
Like Apple's iCloud Private Relay not working in China, UAE/Dubai etc. or letting Facebook and TikTok secretly track you across devices and reinstalls with their iCloud Keychain API
They WILL leak our shit to the highest bidder or the biggest stick
by lofaszvanitt
0 subcomment
- We desperately need some AGI level AI to replace decision makers @ Firefox. Since the spanner that is between the cogs hinders progress big time, pig time.
by xtiansimon
0 subcomment
- Wait. A VPN in the browser? Isn’t the cat already out of the bag at that point?
- Another Mozilla project to be discontinued in 18 months ...
- Now, from the people who brought you Pocket.
Could they please stop integrating services into Firefox? Thank you.
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by zeeshdev2887
0 subcomment
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by HalawehMohann49
0 subcomment
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by Good53139428015
0 subcomment
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by AliEveryHour16
0 subcomment
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by TRYEXCEPT
1 subcomments
- FireFox need to improve their integrations and offerings to be on par with Chrome at this stage. It, at times can be such a bainful browser to use and honestly I don't think a VPN is the next step. Improved account handling & switching would be huge.
by Panzerschrek
1 subcomments
- > Mozilla said the free tier will initially provide 50GB of monthly data to users in the United States, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.
Sadly no countries are mentioned where such VPN is really needed (due to strict internet censorship).
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