Why does Firefox need to control my mic and my camera?
To install Firefox on my phone I must first accept these permissions.
Hardware Control: Record audio:- Allow application to access the audio record path. Take pictures and video. Allow application to take pictures and video with the camera. This allows the application AT ANY TIME TO COLLECT IMAGES THE CAMERA IS SEEING.
I have stopped using Facebook Apps and many Google products because they what this sort of contol and basically I don't trust them. Why do so many apps need such spying power? and where can I download an old version of Firefox.android that pre dates this control freaky version? After all it used to work just fine without. Thanks Jonpon
All Replies (7)
hello Jonpon, the reason behind all the requested permissions is explained in How does Firefox for Android use the permissions it requests?
access to hardware controls in particular is used for technologies like webrtc: https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2013/09/17/webrtc-now-available-across-mobile-and-desktop-with-new-firefox-for-android-compatibility/
of course your camera/microphone will not turned on automatically, but there will be a dialog that enables you to choose if you want to do so each time a page is requesting that. for a demo how this is done please visit: https://apprtc.appspot.com
Thanks for the speedy reply Philipp, I have always held Firefox in high regard and have great respect for the Mozilla movement, but I am still sceptically about giving them carte-blanch with my recording equipment. I have read the current privacy policy, but I don't read it every day and i don't expect to get an email from Mozilla every time it is modified. Why can't such permissions be optional? I would rather see if I can manage life without WebRTC technology (after all I kind of managed so far) rather than give Facebook, Twitter ,Google and all the others the right to snoop.
making permissions optional and controllable for the users is something that would have to be implemented on the OS level. if you have a device with android 4.3 or above it might already work through this hack: www.androidpolice.com/2013/07/25/app-ops-android-4-3s-hidden-app-permission-manager-control-permissions-for-individual-apps/
I agree with Jonpon
The older versions of firefox where great. However all these permissions are getting out of control. I read through the link explaing the reasons for the permissions, but sorry that still does not justify the reasons. Why would anyone agree to allow gps, video and audio permissions for a web browser, how long before someone finds out where you live videos you new TV, playstation, ipod ...... goes around and helps themselves to it.
Why is this a good idea. It's a web browser, a web browser a web browser, not a gps app, camera app or anyother type of app. When and if I want a gps app, I will get one. If I need a camera app, I will get one, I will choose, I will not let firefox choose for me. Firefox this is really really bad. Bad app. Bad app uninstall, go away.
The really sad thing is that so many other apps now are doing this as well. I would like to have android 4.3 to block these permissions but that is not going to happen for some time as my android 4.1.2 is still got a year to go on the plan. Until then, No soup for you firefox, come back 1 year.
Bad firefox.
Modified by SatansEvilTwin
hello, the geolocation WebAPI and WebRTC are new web standards that won't go away and are implemented in all full-fledged browsers (firefox, chrome, opera). furthermore they have especially useful usecases on mobile devices.
as already stated before, non of these permissions will be used automatically by firefox of course - but you will be asked to approve or disapprove each single request by a webpage.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebRTC
https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/geolocation/
Not every thing new is good. Just because you say it's a new standard does not mean it's a good idea. Every thing was new at some point in time. Nuclear bombs where new at one point, but they are not a good idea.
Another NSA plot.
Modified by SatansEvilTwin
well it was not my intention to go into the pro and cons of this development, but i just wanted to make it clear that you shouldn't have hopes that it goes away but just to stress it again: firefox puts you in full control over when you want to enable video/location services!
in fact geolocation is present in firefox on desktop for years now and very few websites make use of that capability at all, so i would actually be surprised if you have seen the prompt to activate it often. the same thing with WebRTC - it is in firefox for desktop since june. so the actual impact seems to be negligible, and there is no need to exaggerate the issue (atom bombs, nsa)...
finally, WebRTC enables properly encrypted peer-to-peer communication (video, audio, chat & file transmissions) between browsers/users - i'm not sure if the NSA will be that excited about it...