Mozilla: We’re Not Selling (or Buying) Your Personal Firefox Data

Mozilla, the nonprofit company behind the Firefox browser, is reassuring users about the use of their personal data after a controversial change to its FAQ earlier this week.

A segment of the FAQ, titled “Does Firefox sell your personal data?”—which assured users it “never has” and “never will” offer their data for sale—recently disappeared. Users quickly spotted the change, prompting concern on Mozilla’s GitHub and Reddit communities, ArsTechnica notes, with some users even recommending different browsers.

One Firefox user writing on X even posted “RIP Firefox” in response to the amendments.

Meanwhile, a new clause appeared in Firefox’s terms of use. “When you upload or input information through Firefox, you hereby grant us a nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license to use that information to help you navigate, experience, and interact with online content as you indicate with your use of Firefox,” it read.

In response, Mozilla said an attempt at clarity instead “created some confusion and concern.”

“We need a license to allow us to make some of the basic functionality of Firefox possible,” Mozilla said in a blog post. “Without it, we couldn’t use information typed into Firefox, for example. It does NOT give us ownership of your data or a right to use it for anything other than what is described in the Privacy Notice.”

Mozilla chalked up the change in the wording of the FAQ to legal considerations, saying the word “sell” has a broad legal definition in “many jurisdictions.” It also clarified that any data it shares with third parties “is stripped of potentially identifying information.”

Mozilla has contended with other privacy controversies in the past year. In September 2024, a nonprofit digital privacy group called Noyb filed a complaint against Mozilla over a Firefox feature dubbed Privacy-Preserving Attribution (PPA). Mozilla said the feature helps Firefox send data about user activity to advertisers in a way that preserves privacy, but the group alleged the feature violated Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

If you’re still concerned about your data, you can head here to learn how to tweak your privacy settings on Firefox. And if you’re considering trying out different browsers, check out PCMag’s comparison of the most popular choices.

About Will McCurdy

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I’m a reporter covering weekend news. Before joining PCMag in 2024, I picked up bylines in BBC News, The Guardian, The Times of London, The Daily Beast, Vice, Slate, Fast Company, The Evening Standard, The i, TechRadar, and Decrypt Media.

I’ve been a PC gamer since you had to install games from multiple CD-ROMs by hand. As a reporter, I’m passionate about the intersection of tech and human lives. I’ve covered everything from crypto scandals to the art world, as well as conspiracy theories, UK politics, and Russia and foreign affairs.

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