Firefox 14, stops caching user content from websites.
Mozilla has plugged a privacy-related security hole in Firefox 13 and released a fixed version of its web browser. The flaw allowed the software's speed-dial-alike "new tab" feature to take snapshots of supposedly secure HTTPS sessions.
Punters sounded the alarm over the feature that, for example, revealed online bank account details or private messages in webmail sessions to the next user of a shared PC. Mozilla quickly acknowledged the behaviour was undesirable and issued a workaround and privacy advice in early June.
The browser maker bundled in a more comprehensive fix with Firefox 14, which stops the caching of content from sensitive websites, as a statement by Mozilla explained:
The new tab feature that displays thumbnails of your favorite and recently visited sites in Firefox now omits privacy-sensitive websites like banking or webmail sites. The new tab thumbnails are based on your browsing history and you can easily control the experience by moving or deleting the thumbnails.
Firefox 14, released on 17 July, automatically encrypts web searches through Google, while leaving the back porch accessible to advertisers, as explained in our earlier story here.
Firefox 14 also changes the way the globe icon (to the left of the URL in the address bar) works. The icon remains a globe when the browser accesses a site that is unencrypted, but becomes a a grey padlock icon if a site uses SSL encryption. If a site is secure with the added benefit of an EV (extended validation) certificate, the browser flashes up a green padlock icon and includes the name of the site's owner. These changes are also designed to make spoofing harder, as Mozilla explains here.
Firefox 14 also introduces other features and performance tweaks (listed here) as well as fixing various security bugs, five of which Mozilla lists as critical.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/07/19/firefox_14_new_tab_fix/
Firefox 14 encrypts Google search, but advertisers can still strip-search you.
Mozilla has rolled out Firefox 14, which automatically encrypts web searches through Google, but the new release leaves an important back door open to advertisers.
The move also quietly undermines Mozilla’s crusade in the past years on maintaining the privacy of netizens by using Do-Not-Track as a plea to websites not to track users' searches.
Firefox 14 now sets HTTPS Google as its search default, which Mozilla boasts shields its users from network snoopers and Wi-Fi hackers sniffing up search data.
The idea is you’ll have both anonymity of search and security of transaction while surfing over your chai double-shot latte over at Starbucks.
Announcing support for HTTPS back in May, Mozilla said that using HTTPS helps "providers like Google remove information from the referrer string". The referrer is an HTTP header field transmitted between the browser and the web page that tells the website which earlier pages the user has visited.
However, what Mozilla didn’t flag up today or back in May is the fact that if you happen to click on an ad on a page you hit then the encryption is removed and advertisers can see who you are and where you’ve been.
The justification given by Google for this leak in its secure search is the inevitable ability to let advertisers server up more accurately targeted ads. Google says:
If you click on an ad on the results page, your browser will send an unencrypted referrer that includes your query to the advertiser’s site. This provides a mechanism to the advertiser so that the advertiser can improve the relevancy of the ads that are presented to you. If you are concerned about referrer information being sent without encryption to the website you clicked on, we recommend using our existing encrypted search service at https://encrypted.google.com. Many web browsers also provide the ability to disable referrers as well.
It’s unsurprising that Google would leave a backdoor open to the advertisers whose dollars keep Google afloat and upon whom its business depends.
According to Mozilla here:
Encrypting our users’ searches is our next step into giving users better control over their data online. Enabling HTTPS for Google searches helps Firefox users maintain better control over who sees things they search for — queries that are often sensitive. We’re excited to see this improvement in our upcoming releases now that we, with Google’s help, have been able to provide our users a secure and responsive secure search.
Defending the move, and responding to Sullivan here, Mozilla’s Firefox director Asa Dotzler said:
We’ve made the connection between the user and Google secure from snooping. That’s what SSL does and that’s why we’ve implemented it. Google can do what ever it wants with the data once it gets it, but the bad guys sniffing your wi-fi connection cannot get at your information.
Mozilla’s position seems clear: it’s buying into the wire-line encryption. What happens at the end point is up to Google – including stripping your searches of privacy.
We contacted Mozilla to see whether this is the situation and whether Mozilla sees a conflict between HTTPS secure search and its stance on DNT.
"Every site has a responsibility to handle user data with care and integrity. Using HTTPS for search in Firefox is an important privacy feature that protects sensitive search data from eavesdropping but, if you don't trust the site receiving that data to handle it properly, no client-side technology can restore that trust.
When we introduced Do Not Track last year, it was based on the belief that most sites do value the trust of their users, and want to respect the choices their users make. We can't force that respect with technology but we've been delighted to see how many people, and how many sites, believe as we do."
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/07/18/firefox_14_secure_search_google/