First release of the Thunderbird for Android app and a little bit of drama

Christian

3 minutes

November 11, 2024

First release of the Thunderbird for Android app and a little bit of drama

Photo by Pixabay: https://www.pexels.com/photo/red-pencil-on-top-of-white-window-envelope-236713/

I had already forgotten that Mozilla bought K9-Mail in June 2022 in order to transform K9-Mail into Thunderbird on Android. Now I was reminded again as on October 30th 2024 the first Android version of Thunderbird was released.

However the initial beta releases were accompanied by a little bit of drama regarding the data privacy topic. As the first releases of the Thunderbird App contained telemetry trackers from Mozilla and those were enabled by default (Opt-Out instead of the more data privacy friendly Opt-In). Additionally the user wasn't made aware of this during the install and configuration process.

These facts became aware to many users through the following GitHub Issue: Thunderbird Issue 8199: Expose the ability to mange Telemetry settings on first-time use where the reporter just stated in a factual way that he expects these settings to be off initially.

However the first reply to that issue didn't make things better. Apparently a Senior Manager/Mobile Engineering at MZLA Technologies Corporation, the subsidiary of the Mozilla Corporation of which Thunderbird is now a part of, wrote the following as a reply:

Unfortunately we cannot make this type of data collection opt-in because the limited data from voluntary reports wouldn’t provide enough insights to make informed product decisions. Opt-in data would come from a small, biased subset, leading to flawed conclusions.

Knowing the Android ecosystem covers a vast range of hardware and form factors, we need to have a mechanism to make better decisions on how features are being used, and have information in which environments user might be having trouble.

In line with Mozilla’s data practices, the default data collected contains no personal information. This helps us understand how features are used and where issues may occur, while minimizing data points and retaining only what's necessary. When we decide on new probes, we actively consider if we really need the information, and if there are ways we could reduce the needed retention time or scope.

While I can't offer an opt-in at this time, I understand your concerns and genuinely appreciate that you're thinking critically about privacy. You might also be interested in a recent talk about our need for privacy respecting telemetry. https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/08/thunderbird-goes-to-guadec-2024/

This again sparked a lot of comments who can be sorted into the following categories:

Disappointment that an application developed by Mozilla uses such shady practises. Along with criticism that users are not informed about this and there are no information on what type of information is gathered and how it is used.
Notices on the various laws forbidding such data collection (especially the GDPR from the EU).
Sadness that while K9-Mail was tracker free, Thunderbird obviously won't. Which disappoints many data privacy focused users.

Or as someone, sarcastically, pointed out on Mastodon (Source):

How could K-9 be developed and become the best email app for Android, and even make ‘informed product decisions’ without a tracker? Sarcasm over.

With the 8.0b2 release that feature was removed and will, hopefully, be reworked in a more user-consenting way.

Personally I am also very disappointed and my anticipation has taken a huge blow. Mozilla once stood as a beacon of user-centred interests. And while I wholeheartedly agree that they should be able to get usage metrics I too want this to happen in an open and consenting way. Enabling the user to actually make a choice and inform me about the nature of the data being transmitted.