Firefox 86 Gains Total Cookie Protection and Multiple Picture-in-Picture Views

[MacRumors]

Mozilla today released Firefox 86 for Macs, Windows, and Linux machines, introducing a new feature called Total Cookie Protection.

Total Cookie Protection is designed to stop cookies from tracking users across the web by introducing a "separate cookie jar for every website."

Total Cookie Protection is available as part of Firefox's Enhanced Tracking Protection functionality, and can be enabled when the browser is set to ETP Strict Mode. Mozilla says that Firefox now offers "strong, comprehensive protection" to combat cookie tracking.

The update also adds support for multiple picture-in-picture views, plus keyboard controls for fast forward and rewind. Firefox 86 is available now from the Mozilla website.

Article Link: Firefox 86 Gains Total Cookie Protection and Multiple Picture-in-Picture Views

 

[jz0309]

that sounds really cool and useful maybe I need to install it

 

[Jimmy James]

Good. Makes me wonder what took so long. This is important.

 

[bobbie424242]

Firefo x86

 

[Apple_Robert]

That sounds like a really good idea and probably makes for better set up control of websites. I will give this a download.

 

[luvbug]

It'd be sweet for MR to do a feature comparing the privacy features of Safari, FF, Brave, Chrome (for example).

 

[JoeInMilwaukee]

Fantastic! Now when I'm logged into my Gmail account and visit YouTube in another tab, I'm not automatically logged in. Also, other sites don't prompt me to log in with my Google account.

 

[sdz]

Cleverly thought out @ Mozilla

 

[CJ Dorschel]

I don’t know what Apple did with Safari but the last update (running on Catalina and Big Sur) is a mess with how it handles tracking and cookies. I have to manually select and clear out sites in Website Data as I need some site cookies to remain for verification so I don‘t block all cookies and use third party apps like Cookie and option-click to clear history as well as cache, etc. Using Privacy mode negates the ability of keeping my systems verified for banking sites, etc. I hate that Safari keeps a large digital footprint.

It’d be nice to simply have a whitelist and click clear history and cache of sites i don’t want as Cookie should but since the most recent version of Safari even that doesn’t clear out history and cookies.

Something like this would be much welcomed. Throw in a better Bookmarks manager (find duplicates and expired bookmark links, sort alphabetically, etc should be basic features). I always loved Safari but now I’m using Firefox more.

 

[Strategia]

The best and most private browser gets even better.

 

[acgmph]

I don’t know what Apple did with Safari but the last update (running on Catalina and Big Sur) is a mess with how it handles tracking and cookies. I have to manually select and clear out sites in Website Data as I need some site cookies to remain for verification so I don‘t block all cookies and use third party apps like Cookie and option-click to clear history as well as cache, etc. Using Privacy mode negates the ability of keeping my systems verified for banking sites, etc. I hate that Safari keeps a large digital footprint.

It’d be nice to simply have a whitelist and click clear history and cache of sites i don’t want as Cookie should but since the most recent version of Safari even that doesn’t clear out history and cookies.

Something like this would be much welcomed. Throw in a better Bookmarks manager (find duplicates and expired bookmark links, sort alphabetically, etc should be basic features). I always loved Safari but now I’m using Firefox more.

You should submit this feedback to Apple. They do read those things and actually implement some of them.

 

[rictus007]

Time to acuse Mozilla of monopoly for not allowing cross-website tracking

 

[Picklefoot]

You gotta wonder why it didn’t work this was to begin with.

 

[Realityck]

I’m surprised this cookie management was never done before?

 

[chipchen]

You gotta wonder why it didn’t work this was to begin with.

Because privacy kills small businesses like Facebook! - MZ

 

[emvath]

All I know is, this sounds delicious.

 

[throAU]

Mozilla today released Firefox 86 for Macs, Windows, and Linux machines, introducing a new feature called Total Cookie Protection.

Total Cookie Protection is designed to stop cookies from tracking users across the web by introducing a "separate cookie jar for every website."

Total Cookie Protection is available as part of Firefox's Enhanced Tracking Protection functionality, and can be enabled when the browser is set to ETP Strict Mode. Mozilla says that Firefox now offers "strong, comprehensive protection" to combat cookie tracking.

The update also adds support for multiple picture-in-picture views, plus keyboard controls for fast forward and rewind. Firefox 86 is available now from the Mozilla website.

Article Link: Firefox 86 Gains Total Cookie Protection and Multiple Picture-in-Picture Views

It's really an indictment of the web development industry that this wasn't how cookies were set up to operate from the start.

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

Firefox starts up so slow for me compared to Chrome or Edge (on a PC).

Fantastic! Now when I'm logged into my Gmail account and visit YouTube in another tab, I'm not automatically logged in. Also, other sites don't prompt me to log in with my Google account.

You just made me think about the most irritating thing I deal with -- Microsoft sites. It's frustrating trying to actually log out of a MS site (O365 Admin Center for instance) and log in with another account because it always seems to remember! Let alone, logging into 3 tabs of M365 under 3 different accounts, which is impossible.

I just tried it with Firefox 86.0 and it works fantastically! Finally, I can log in as who I want at MS sites without having to play games trying to get it to forget the last account I logged in as (or using Incognito windows).

 

[shapesinaframe]

Wow. 25 years later Netscape Mozilla finally got around to implementing separate cookie jars per website.
#slowclap
👏 👏 👏 👏

 

[Darth.Titan]

It's really an indictment of the web development industry that this wasn't how cookies were set up to operate from the start.

But it is. This is exactly how cookies were set up from the start.

I can’t put a site online at mysite.com and just rummage around in your cookies when you visit and pull info from when you visited yoursite.com. That’s just how cookies work. It’s the same-origin policy at work.

I’m very confused by this “feature”

 

[now i see it]

are they chocolate chip or sugar cookies?

 

[kalafalas]

Wow, this is a really epic feature IMO. Does safari offer something similar?

 

[throAU]

But it is. This is exactly how cookies were set up from the start.

I can’t put a site online at mysite.com and just rummage around in your cookies when you visit and pull info from when you visited yoursite.com. That’s just how cookies work. It’s the same-origin policy at work.

I’m very confused by this “feature”

Pretty sure you can make your cookies readable by other sites when you create them. I.e., if you run an ad network you can set a cookie readable by any site, etc. to track people across the web more easily.

This will restrict a cookie to only the site that set it, irrespective of what the site sets its access permissions to.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

As far as I can tell, Mozilla is responsible for the web working. Nobody else documents how browsers work even 10% as well as Mozilla Developer Network.

Apple barely documents Safari. Google barely says a peep about Chrome. Microsoft... they might have okay documentation (not sure) but who cares, nobody uses IE or Edge. Mozilla does a better job of explaining the behavior of other browsers in their footnotes of how Firefox does than any of the other browser vendors document their own browsers.

===

Having said all that, what is up with Cookies? Why is getting and setting cookies from javascript such a miserable experience. The API appears unchanged from Netscape 0.9b from 27 years ago, which wouldn’t be half bad if it resembled JSON or something, but it’s just the weirdest string thing any developer could have ever imagined.

Why did every browser just copy the old design? Why didn’t any vendor ever propose making some improvements?

It seems like cookies aren’t actually meant to be used by developers of websites.

 

[throAU]

Why did every browser just copy the old design?

Compatibility. Netscape used to be 90% of the web. Then it was split between IE and Netscape and as IE grew it copied Netscape features to be compatible. Everyone else copied them.

If you do cookies some other magical way on your site to support browser X and it doesn't support the other browsers, you need to do it the old way anyway. Which is 2x the work.