If you’ve been using Firefox Quantum, you might notice that embedded material doesn’t show up in browsers. The most problematic of them all is Twitter. You might see the text in a tweet, but any other information, images, or videos aren’t visible. The cause is Firefox’s tracking protection. Twitter tracks you across your pages, just like many other websites, including FaceBook. Tracking protection can block websites that would harness your traffic, learn about you, potentially identify you, and use that information to advertise to you. However, there are trade-offs. You miss out on the content you want.
It’s a tough decision, but if you want to do it, here’s how you can turn off tracking protection on all of your websites. Best of all, Firefox makes it easier to turn it back on than you might think.
Remove Tracking Protection on a Page
Those parts that are “not secure?” That’s social networking.
There are two ways to do this. The first is by turning off tracking protection for an individual page. You’ll find this on the left side of your address bar. There’s a button that contains the lock and a shield on it. Click it. You can turn off tracking protection for an individual site here. Personally, I have tracking protection turned off on Leaf and Core this way, so I can see the tweets I embed and be sure my page is displaying properly.
Turn Off All Tracking Protection
The second way is to turn it off completely. I don’t recommend this, but Firefox does have a middle ground. You can turn off tracking protection for all websites, except when you use private browsing mode. While using private browsing, your browsing will remain, well, private.
You’ll find this in your general preferences. Press command + comma, or go to Firefox > Preferences. From here, select Security and Privacy, and scroll down to tracking protection. Switch it from the default position (on) to only activated during private browsing.
Security and privacy are great, but not if it means losing what makes the web wonderful. Still, the same features won’t be right for everyone. If you’re willing to sacrifice your privacy a little, you can get all the web has to offer. Toss in a good ad blocker and it’ll almost be like you never gave up anything at all. It’s a shame users have to decide between all or nothing, but the web is free, and someone is always looking to profit off of it.