Firefox removes "do not track" feature support

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Perceived ineffectiveness of DNT

  • Many argue DNT “never worked”: it relied on voluntary compliance, most ad/analytics platforms ignored it, and it gave users a false sense of privacy.
  • Some developers admit they simply forgot to support it; others say corporate support only happened when bundled into compliance tools.
  • Several view its removal as sensible cleanup of a misleading, marginal feature.

Legal and regional aspects

  • Others counter that DNT does matter legally in some jurisdictions:
    • German courts have ruled the DNT header is a valid GDPR opt‑out signal, binding on services like LinkedIn.
    • Some EU sites and tools (e.g., certain price comparison and analytics platforms) reportedly honored it and used it to suppress tracking or cookie prompts.
  • Critics say Mozilla is acting as if only US law counts and ignoring existing EU/German rulings.

Global Privacy Control vs DNT

  • Firefox now promotes Global Privacy Control (GPC) instead.
  • Some think GPC is just a renamed DNT (Sec-GPC: 1 vs DNT: 1) with similar technical issues.
  • Supporters say GPC has better legal alignment in places like California; skeptics argue sites that ignored DNT will also ignore GPC.
  • It’s noted that GPC is narrower (often framed as “do not sell/share data” rather than “do not track”) and not clearly GDPR‑compliant.

Privacy, tracking, and fingerprinting

  • Several note DNT added one more fingerprinting bit, ironically aiding tracking.
  • Others argue uniqueness across sites is fine if the fingerprint changes per‑site and scripts are constrained.
  • Many stress that technical anti‑tracking is an arms race; legal bans plus browser‑side blocking are both needed.

Views on Mozilla’s direction

  • Some see the removal as minor and user‑friendly; others call it a loss of user agency and a “clown move” given recent legal wins for DNT.
  • There is broader frustration that Mozilla is aligning with adtech and “privacy‑preserving attribution,” making Firefox harder to support.

Alternatives and proposed solutions

  • Common advice: use Firefox or forks with uBlock Origin, NoScript/medium‑mode blocking, cookie auto‑deletion, or specialized consent‑auto‑denial tools.
  • Several propose browser‑level consent and cookie handling, or even built‑in, standardized ad/tracker blocking instead of honor‑system headers.
  • Broader debate emerges on ad‑funded vs subscription web models and whether aggressive adblocking is ethical or simply necessary self‑defense.