Reportedly, people were using these services for malicious purposes especially launching phishing and malware attacks.
Mozilla has announced to permanently shut down two of its promising ventures Firefox Send, the free file-sharing/transfer service, and Firefox Notes, the note-taking extension after people started using them for nefarious purposes.
According to the non-profit organization, the sunsetting is done to ‘tighten and refine’ its products and prevent online attacks.
See: Mozilla VPN – Firefox private network VPN is finally arriving
It is worth noting that it hasn’t even been a month when Mozilla’s corporate division underwent significant restructuring, and 250 employees were laid off, which makes up around one-quarter of its entire workforce.
Firefox Send debuted in 2017 as a pilot, and last year it was officially rolled out for desktops and mobile phones. The service supported end-to-end encryption, and users could securely transfer files to anyone for free.
However, the feature received backlash when it was reported that people were using it to send malware. The service was suspended temporarily and released an official statement, which read:
“Firefox Send was a promising tool for encrypted file sharing. Unfortunately, some abusive users were beginning to use Send to ship malware and conduct spear-phishing attacks.”
It is evident that Mozilla has no intention of relaunching this service, and now it is permanently shut down.
Firefox Notes was launched in 2018 as an extension for the Firefox browser and a standalone mobile application for Android devices. It allowed users to synchronize notes across different platforms.
The company has confirmed that this service will be shut down in November, but its browser add-on will be available for existing installations. Mozilla won’t be supporting the service or any new install, though.
Oh look, Firefox Send is on hiatus. Wonder how long it's been gone, who noticed, and if it'll ever return. https://t.co/1Qs4yYO6qz
— Stephen Shankland (@stshank) August 11, 2020
Mozilla will continue to offer its main services like its VPN (Virtual Private Network) and web browser, etc.
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