FIREFOX IMPLEMENTS ANOTHER TOR-LIKE PRIVACY FEATURE

The 58 Firefox version will block attempts to fingerprint users using HTML5 canvas elements. Canvas blocking is an important addition to Firefox's user privacy protection measures, as canvas fingerprinting has been used for a long time by the advertising industry to track users. 

Firefox is the world's third most popular browser – according to Netmarketshare – this feature allows websites to extract data that has been collected by the browser. This data includes software version, operating system, screen resolution and even the list of fonts installed on the PC. 

Canvas fingerprinting works by loading canvas HTML tag inside a hidden iframe and making the user's browser draw a series of elements and texts. Canvas fingerprinting doesn't need to store anything in the user's browser, which means there are very few legal complications that come with it and this user tracking/fingerprinting solution has become a favourite among ad networks. Firefox 58 will now ask users to opt-in to the collection of this data. Those that use the Tor browser (which is built on the skeleton of Firefox) will know this has been a feature for years. The firm has likely done this because while canvas fingerprinting is questionable it does provide useful information according to Mark Stockley at Sophos.

“It’s actually a fantastically useful feature, but just happens to be a very popular fingerprinting technique too,” Stockley explained in a blog post.

Firefox 58 is expected to be available in early 2018 according to Mozilla’s roadmap.