There were no problems in 2017 or before, we were doing the same exactly the same during Firefox times (we went through security and privacy audits). Data collection is and always was safe wrt to privacy.
Why the ruckus then? Because some assume that is data is sent, privacy is compromised, period. They do not know how to do it, and they assume it's impossible. Instead of checking the claims for themselves (code is public, data can be inspected, documentation, etc.) they prefer to stick to their belief system, which is more comfortable and does not imply hard work. The press release that FF -- written by one of these people with a lot of biases and published without review -- did not help as it was misleading.
We did a big mistake back then. Instead of rebutting it, we chose to ignore the FUD assuming that facts would prevail. They did not.
Sadly the community is "scared", we have been congratulated and lauded by anyone who checked our systems. But never endorsed in public, there is little to gain and a lot to lose (you are getting a sneak preview right now).
Sad story, extremely frustrating too, but there is nothing we can do now.
Why the ruckus then? Because some assume that is data is sent, privacy is compromised, period. They do not know how to do it, and they assume it's impossible. Instead of checking the claims for themselves (code is public, data can be inspected, documentation, etc.) they prefer to stick to their belief system, which is more comfortable and does not imply hard work. The press release that FF -- written by one of these people with a lot of biases and published without review -- did not help as it was misleading.
We did a big mistake back then. Instead of rebutting it, we chose to ignore the FUD assuming that facts would prevail. They did not.
Sadly the community is "scared", we have been congratulated and lauded by anyone who checked our systems. But never endorsed in public, there is little to gain and a lot to lose (you are getting a sneak preview right now).
Sad story, extremely frustrating too, but there is nothing we can do now.