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Firefox 42 will not allow unsigned extensions

(wiki.mozilla.org)
288 points fernandotakai | 1 comments | 11 Aug 15 03:51 UTC | HN request time: 0.21s | source
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userbinator ◴[11 Aug 15 12:02 UTC] No.10040344[source]▶
Mozilla's hypocrisy is astounding:

https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2013/01/29/putting-users-i...

"Users should have the choice of what software and plugins run on their machine."

https://blog.mozilla.org/theden/2014/12/15/introducing-a-sma...

"Firefox is dedicated to putting users in control of their online experience"

More recently:

https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/06/02/firefox-puts-you-in...

"Firefox Puts You in Control of Your Online Life".

The slogan, as found on https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/ , is now "Firefox is created by a global non-profit dedicated to putting individuals in control online." I believe it used to be "users" - see above - but was silently changed. I suppose these "individuals" are the people at Mozilla...?

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TazeTSchnitzel ◴[11 Aug 15 12:28 UTC] No.10040466[source]▶
Users still have control. You can remove plugins you don't like, and if you really want to, use a version of a plugin which allows unsigned extensions.

Arguably this change might give users more control: Trojan horses can no longer secretly side load malware.

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1. userbinator ◴[11 Aug 15 12:37 UTC] No.10040506[source]▶
Users still have control. You can remove plugins you don't like, and if you really want to, use a version of a plugin which allows unsigned extensions.

You could argue that as long as users can still download a disk editor and change any byte of the disk on their machine they still have control (in fact patching out this signature check could probably be done with a single-byte change to the binary...); the problem is when this control is made more and more difficult.