Google Analytics is used to track users.

[ghost]

Describe the problem and steps to reproduce it:

Google Analytics is used on the about:addons site while browsing not installed AddOns.

What happened?

It's tracking users and giving data to google directly without any consent.

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EDIT from @kumar303: Mozilla has a legal contract with Google that prevents them from using our Google Analytics data for mining or from sharing it with third parties, among other privacy-protecting provisions.

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What did you expect to happen?

No tracking anywhere in a browser that advertises with privacy.

Anything else we should know?

Yes, remove all tracking everywhere. (General Bug)

[tofumatt]

As I mentioned in #3156: we will not be removing analytics support entirely. It is extremely useful to us and we have already weighed the cost/benefit of using tracking.

That said, I think we should only be enabling tracking for users who have opted-in to sharing their data usage in Firefox. I'd guess respecting the Telemetry checkbox (https://www.dropbox.com/s/blcumfu2vzrvt9f/Screenshot%202017-07-12%2014.13.00.png?dl=0) would work. Or maybe having a new checkbox if piggy-backing on that one is problematic from a legal perspective.

[tofumatt]

Actually, @muffinresearch pointed out we could probably just observe Do Not Track here, because this pane is actually a web page loaded in an iFrame inside the browser page. That might be faster to ship. Just thinking aloud 😄

I'm definitely for giving users the option to disable this.

[tofumatt]

Wanted to address your position though:

We don't give the "data directly to Google". See the discussion here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=858839. The short version is:

tl;dr: We now have an option to opt-out of Google doing anything with the data that Google Analytics collections on Mozilla websites. GA tracking is anonymous and at the aggregate level and we use it to improve the experience of our websites.

We are collecting aggregate and non-identifiable data in numbers to ensure our development/UX changes are met well. We can respect privacy and still have analytics; in fact Mozilla's aim is for an experience that values user privacy and usability (I'd say Apple also wants UX that fits that mold, as an example). We need some data, anonymised and aggregated, to do this.

[dertuxmalwieder]

We now have an option to opt-out

Privacy: Option to opt-in.

Anti-privacy: Option to opt-out.

[sleeksorrow]

Without elaborating on opt-in or opt-out, there is one clear fact: A user that has telemetry disabled has clearly stated that he does NOT want to "Share performance, usage, hardware and customisation data about your browser with Mozilla". https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/share-telemetry-data-mozilla-help-improve-firefox

If you do this add-on tracking despite this option is turned off, this is a clear breach of trust. If I have this option off, then I expect that exactly such a tracking of usage and customisation like described above is NOT happening.

Still code from a service you don't control is running on this site. You never know when Google changes anything there or get's hijacked at this point. (Which is a very good target btw.)

[sleeksorrow]

(Since the comment I replied to has been deleted, I quote it without username):

If you do this add-on tracking despite this option is turned off, this is a clear breach of trust.

Not really, Google Analytics does not share with Mozilla. (But with Google which, in turn, shares with Mozilla. But technically that's not the same thing.)

Agreed, a laywer could take this route to defend that in court. But somehow I doubt that it is benefiting that Mozilla users need lawyers to be able to decide if they can trust the options they set in Firefox or if there is some legal way for Mozilla to do what they stated they do not want.

[Johann-Tree]

We don't give the "data directly to Google".

When using Google Analytics, the data is saved on a server owned by Google, right? Then the data is given directly to Google. And I do not want that.

[k00ni]

Why not using a Piwik hosted by Mozilla instead of Google Analytics?

[uniquePWD]

Various users have probably opted in to Telemetry not knowing that also means opting into Google Analytics. Given that Mozilla released the billboard "Big Browser is watching" it's beyond disappointing that they would contribute to the very thing they're calling Google out on without first notifying users of the fact or giving users the option to opt out.

[justjanne]

Who is legally responsible for this feature (Name, Corporation, Address)? This is a clear violation of the opt-in requirement for tracking that the EU Cookie Directive (which handles all kinds of tracking) sets, and it seems like I’d have to go the legal route, considering that the suggested "fix" doesn’t fix anything.

[tofumatt]

Let's clear a few things up:

1. Right now the about:addons page loads an iFrame with content hosted on a Mozilla website ("The Discovery Pane"). This page contains Google Analytics. Because we don't allow add-ons to run on about:* pages, add-ons that would block GA don't work here.
2. Opting in to Telemetry doesn't mean opting in to GA. I was proposing using that feature as a possible signifier the user is okay with sending usage data to Mozilla. That's not currently the case.
3. Our agreement with Google Analytics means our data is aggregated and anonymised.
4. We won't use Piwik. Mozilla uses Google Analytics for website analytics. Hosting our own is more work for a worse product.

This issue is for the discussion around disabling Google Analytics usage on the page that serves the Discovery Pane. Implementing that feature is, to me, a good idea. We have heard the opinions here of people who do not trust Google. For now obviously you can block Google Analytics domains in your DNS settings and opting not to use the about:addons feature (you can also disable the discovery pane from loading by blocking requests to discovery.addons.mozilla.org where the page is hosted). We won't be entertaining the notion that Google will hoard all the data it has agreed to keep anonymous and private for now.

So: please keep this discussion civil in tone. I would ask that you assume good faith in Mozilla if you would like to discuss how to improve Firefox and limit the pages that load analytics. If you are assuming Mozilla will act badly, then I would encourage you simply to block the discovery pane from loading as I mentioned above.

[toolforger]

Question is what's carrying more weight for the Mozilla Foundation: The promise of respecting user privacy, or getting more accurate usage statistics with less work.

It's good to know that the Mozilla Foundation does the latter.

It's bad that the MF thinks is can pass on data to third parties because it's convenient, without asking the user for consent (maybe Mozilla did, implicitly, but then I wasn't made aware that the decision involved third parties, so I still didn't consent even if the MF supposes I did).

I hear you say that user tracking is not a black-or-white thing.
Technically, you're right. Aggregate data is different from individual data, and there are many, many shades of aggregation.
Socially, however, people cannot check what shade of grey the MF is doing now, due to lack of time and/or expertise. So they have to be pessimistic (as far as they're concerned about privacy - the whole debate is moot about those people who are not concerned). And that means that the trust in the MF's privacy promise pegs at 0%, from whatever value it was at before.

[gorhill]

Because we don't allow add-ons to run on about:* pages, add-ons that would block GA don't work here.

This is incorrect, add-ons can block network requests made by about: pages:

The issue is that allowing content blockers to block network requests on about: pages by default has the potential to break other stuff in the browser (example), hence the about: pages are whitelisted by default in uBlock Origin specifically (the whitelist directive about-scheme can be removed by users who are ok with potential breakage elsewhere).

Edit: correction below.