On Fri, 2025-01-31 at 17:50 +1100, George at Clug wrote: > > Does anyone use Firefox to watch DRM protected Video content? > > Is it normal for DRM to display lots of ads whenever Firefox is > loaded?
Hi! What type(s) of ads are you seeing? In other words, are they for random consumer products, or are they specifically only about DRM? Do the ads e.g. open their own new tabs, or are they floating popups, or...? The only ads I see are inline with the programming I view. My livestreaming adventures are presented just like analog TV used to be back in the good ol' days. > I did enable DRM once, a long time ago, and I started getting annoying > ads whenever Firefox was loaded. It took a while for me to determine > it was because of the DRM add-on. The DRM add-on was loaded into the > user's file space. Where are you seeing that? By running "grep widevine.com -i .mozilla/firefox -R", I found my own not-surprising directory here: /home/<user>/.mozilla/firefox/<current-session>/gmp-widevinecdm I grepped that (dot)com because it flashed by when I ran a more generic widevine grep. That directory within ~/.mozilla is a rational place for it since it's Firefox specific. A super quick "locate" and "apt-file" query didn't find anything else on my Debian Trixie. That was as expected. As a matter of fact, locate didn't even find that ~/.mozilla directory likely because of that "dot" in the Mozilla parent directory. > I do not know if displaying the ads was normal DRM add-on behavour or > whether a malisious web page had replaced the originally downloaded > DRM file with a hacked version. If it's not personally invasive to ask, can you remember what website originally triggered the DRM add-on's installation? Mine only comes into play when I surf over to PlutoTV for the first time on newly created profiles. PlutoTV doesn't play the content I binge watch until I agree to install the DRM add-on. That's the last time I ever see any reference to DRM at all. > My solution at the time was to delete any Firefox folders in my > /home/username area (e.g. ~/.mozilla/firefox). DRM was not too > important to me, so I now just do not enable DRM. Depending on one's usage needs, you could generate a secondary profile that is solely for viewing DRM content. Due to the complexity of my own primary Firefox, that's not an attractive option for my usage case because I frequently run PlutoTV as an ongoing form of white noise in the background. :) > https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-drm > Firefox for desktop supports the Google Widevine CDM for playing DRM- > controlled content. > Disabling Google Widevine from the Add-ons Manager prevents it from > running on your computer and prevents future updates from downloading. > > Please reply if you have had any such experiences. One thought based on my own DRM-ad-free experience is one could... * Generate a brand new test Firefox profile * Surf over to pluto(.)tv since it's NOT triggering ads for me * Load one of their "channels" (e.g. Criminal Minds) to trigger DRM's installation. Try a movie if that doesn't trigger the install. * Close and reopen Firefox a few times to see if the pesky ads experience is the same or different. After going that route, Pluto's cookies can easily be deleted via Firefox's settings option. If I was testing this, I might also additionally load several Youtube videos in case that combination somehow triggers the initial pesky ads depending on where a user resides. Before positive reviews by consumer advocate, Clark Howard, brought PlutoTV to my laptops, my memory recall is that Youtube would occasionally trigger DRM intervention. Or not? It's been a few years. That thought then adds another variable into this because there's always that slight offchance that maybe this is an experience related to a user's country of residence.. and that country's laws regarding DRM. Ultimately, my hope is that PlutoTV will help install the least invasive, least offensive DRM possible, and that the install is then silently applied universally around the Internet. As an afterthought for newer Users who want to poke around in their own Firefox, I found my DRM add-on under: about:addons (in address field) > Plugins (tab found in vertical menu) Click the "..." and choose "Manage" to alter DRM's behavior if it's found there. Best wishes.. Cindy :) -- Talking Rock, Pickens County, Georgia, USA * runs with birdseed! *
