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Search by Image has a new update - the permissions seem offensively excessive & an invasion of privacy.

  • 3 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 7 views
  • Last reply by TyDraniu

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https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/permission-request-messages-firefox-extensions?as=u&utm_source=inproduct The long list of permissions here seem incredibly excessive, completely irrelevant to the task and therefore an invasion of privacy. Some examples: ''Extend developer tools to access your data in open tabs "Download files and read and modify the browser’s download history" "Open files downloaded to your computer" "Read the text of all open tabs" "Access recently closed tabs" "Access your location" "Access browsing history" "Monitor extension usage and manage themes" "Exchange messages with programs other than Firefox" "Read and modify privacy settings" "Control browser proxy settings" "Store unlimited amount of client-side data" Seriously? All I want the browser to do is search for an image, not hand over all my personal information to you. You can't find an image without checking where I am, what else I've been doing, modifying my privacy and browser proxy settings, storing unlimited data, reading everything on my open and recently closed tabs? Is this to be used for commercial purposes? What's going on here? I think it's time to find a new browser. Please explain.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/permission-request-messages-firefox-extensions?as=u&utm_source=inproduct The long list of permissions here seem incredibly excessive, completely irrelevant to the task and therefore an invasion of privacy. Some examples: ''''Extend developer tools to access your data in open tabs '' "Download files and read and modify the browser’s download history" "Open files downloaded to your computer" "Read the text of all open tabs" "Access recently closed tabs" "Access your location" "Access browsing history" "Monitor extension usage and manage themes" "Exchange messages with programs other than Firefox" "Read and modify privacy settings" "Control browser proxy settings" "Store unlimited amount of client-side data"'' Seriously? All I want the browser to do is search for an image, not hand over all my personal information to you. You can't find an image without checking where I am, what else I've been doing, modifying my privacy and browser proxy settings, storing unlimited data, reading everything on my open and recently closed tabs? Is this to be used for commercial purposes? What's going on here? I think it's time to find a new browser. Please explain.

All Replies (3)

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Thanks, but you don't appear to have addressed the issue that this is Firefox requesting permission to all these accesses which appear to have zero to do with searching for an image. If I have to give permission to Firefox to search everything I'm doing on the internet, open files dowloaded on my computer, etc, how is this different from the invasiveness of Google and Facebook?

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Ok, thanks, that's helpful. Appreciate you taking the time to reply.

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Are you talking about this addon?