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WEI can potentially be used to impose restrictions on unlawful activities on the internet, such as downloading YouTube videos and other content, ad blocking, web scraping, etc.
Not one of those things is illegal.
Some are against a site’s TOS and some are outright fine.
If you are not using Firefox now is a good time to start.
Just switched yesterday, was way easier than I thought it would be. I'm converted on all my devices, all my stuff has been synced from Chrome in a few clicks. Just do it people.
If you haven't already, check out Firefox Sync.
You can sync your stuff across Firefox instances (PC, mobile, different PC profiles etc.) You can choose to sync logins, open tabs, bookmarks, add-ons etc.
Each place you use Firefox can choose to sync different stuff, so for example you can sync logins everywhere but only sync open tabs on the PC.
In case you replace the phone or your PC HDD crashes etc. all you have to do is login back to Firefox Sync and you get all that stuff back.
I love Firefox so much. Specially the built in sync. I can browse something on my phone and open it on my computer later and continue where I left off.
There is no defense of the move. It's bad for the internet. Pure and simple!
They claim it's to prevent bots, but we all know it'll soon become standard in every WAF out there (Cloudflare, Akamai, etc) to just blanket block browsers failing attestation.
All you need to know what will happen is to root an Android phone. You'd expect Netflix and bank apps and other highly sensitive apps to stop working. Okay, I can accept that, it kind of make sense. But the more you use the phone the more you realize a ton of apps also refuse to work. Zoom complains and marks your session as insecure, the Speedtest app refuses to test your speed, even the fucking weather app won't give you weather anymore. Jira/Confluence/Outlook/Teams also complain about it. It's ridiculous.
Even if it'd trust Google to not misuse the feature and genuinely use it to reduce ad fraud, the problem is the rest of the developers and companies. Those, they absolutely cannot be trusted to not abuse the feature to block everyone. Security "consultants" will start mandating its use to pass security audits, government websites will absolute use it, and before you know it, half the web refuses to work unless you use Chrome, Edge or Safari.
Yup I noticed this also. I used a rooted phone without Google apps on it and so many apps simply refused to work. They use Googles api in the background which means Google finds out about literally everything we do on our phones. They already own the entire operating system but we can't even run apps without them being in the middle.
This is all similar to using Microsoft Windows or Mac OS so I guess people are so used to this behavior that it's somehow ok.
But I'm a long term Linux user and I'm used to the OS not calling home and not reporting what apps I use. And this is how it should be. I'm so over big tech it's not even funny anymore.
I used a rooted phone without Google apps on it and so many apps simply refused to work. They use Googles api in the background
This has nothing to do with being rooted but with Google encouraging people to build apps using its proprietary libraries to make Google Android more valuable than Android Open Source Project. There may be a connection to the EU's attempts to stop Google from forcibly bundling several of its other apps with the Play Store.
For most use cases, good alternatives are available and it's just a matter of developers being lazy, but I'm not sure there's another good option for chat apps to get timely notifications without high battery consumption. MicroG provides an open source alternative to Google's libraries and works for most apps, including chat notifications.
It won't block browsers that spoof their identity? Yeah, sure.
The fraud-fighting project has fired up quite a controversy
fraud-fighting? Even Google's initial pitch was explicitly describing it as a way to sell more ads.
From this github comment:
If you oppose this, don't just comment and complain, contact your antitrust authority today:
- UK:
Dear madam/sir
I dont trust googel. take me seriously.
yours, Willer
Dense US citizen here. Eli5 how I should explain "just trust us not to abuse collection of all your data or else get locked out of the world wide web" applies to antitrust laws for the FTC?
I'm genuinely wanting to submit an email complaint/report. I understand that WEI protects nothing, but risks your data with all the sites you visit, all in an effort just to block possibly unprofitable users -- but I'm not sure how to tie in and word the Breaks Antitrust Laws part.
Thank for your time to post these links.
It's time to use web integrity against them, by blocking access to your site if they "pass" integrity checks, and telling them to use a freedom respecting browser instead.
There's an ongoing protest against this on GitHub, symbolically modifying the code that would implement this in Chromium. See this lemmy post by the person who had this idea, and this GitHub commit. Feel free to "Review changes" --> "Approve". Around 300 people have joined so far.
Fuck Google 2023
Google: Do ~~no~~ ALL evil.
*waiting patiently for EU to catch on to this.
Google may not like the outcome…
It offers web publishers a way to integrate their websites or apps with a code that checks with a trusted party (such as Google)
Imma stop you right there...
I stopped trusting google when they decided to remove the "Do not be evil" clause
So, how the hell is this supposed to prevent bots? Unless Google are planning to completely lock the browser down to prevent user scripting and all extensions then surely you can still automate the browser?
Unless Google are planning to completely lock the browser down to prevent user scripting and all extensions
Ding ding ding!
Just like Trickle Down, “Don’t be evil” has aged well and deserves to be repackaged. /s
They don't care about a "safe web environment". That is not making them any more money. Knowing much more about their users and being able to perfectly match everything a user does anywhere with Googles advertising business, though, will.
While you are at it, convince Apple to allow Firefox on iOS, and decline to use WEI in Safari. Otherwise there's no way to avoid WEI on iPhone, and only one mainstream rendering engine free of this insidious malware. Many companies will shy away from it if it breaks mobile apps on the Apple platform.