1025114 - Fingerprint scanning via HP SimplePass broken

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(WebExtensions :: General, defect)

Description

[[:Cww]]

In Firefox 30, we're seeing numerous reports that HP Simplepass (which enables password authentication via fingerprint scanning) isn't working.

Here are quotes:

Installed Beta 30.0. Immediate issue with my fingerprint reader HP Simple Pass. Before it would remember log-in and password for my Hotmail accounts. After update it does not work anymore. I need to manually enter email and password every time. HP pavilion Notebook PC M7 i7 3610QM 64-bit Win7 

 I, as many others bought my hp pc b/c of the fingerprint scanner. It no longer works in ff 30. Would appreciate being able to use. For now I'll be using IE 


I spent £1000 on a laptop with a biometric reader as continually inputting passwords shall we say irks me. It was fine and dandy up until your latest version...30. Now it doesn't work at all, instead all i have is YOUR option to save passwords.....i don't want that, i want my laptop to save them in a secure file, you know, like my fingerprint reader. Frankly in the last 18 months i have come to rely on it, as i don't even remember most of the passwords i have saved, so you have managed to lock me out of several places, like my damned car insurance file....thanks. Please just send me a link to re-install version 29 so i can access my things again, don't make it hard, just a simple click and go link, not the nonsense on your site with 15 odd options, we're not all savvy with computers and i don't want to be made to scratch my head and have to guess at what i want.

Comment 1

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

This isn't a feature that Firefox itself implements, so I assume it's being provided by a system add-on. Which means this very likely an issue that needs to be debugged and fixed by HP.

Comment 2

[:Gijs (he/him)]

Do we have contacts with the HP folks, Jorge/Mike?

Comment 3

[Jorge Villalobos [:jorgev] (he/him)]

Not me.

Comment 4

[Matt Grimes [:Matt_G]]

I have been talking to the folks at HP. Thanks to Stacy Martin for the intro. They are EOL for version 6 which seems to be the issue. We think it might have broken around the 29 period, so any chance we can find a regression range? They've made it clear they don't plan on fixing it.

Comment 5

[Lukas Blakk [:lsblakk] use ?needinfo]

Tracking this as a regression for now until we can confirm if there is in fact something in our code that changed this functionality.  Also tracking for FF31 so that, if there is a potential forward fix or backout we can get it into that release.

Comment 6

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

From what I've seen, the add-on had binary components (to talk to NSS?), which means that EOL means "no really, it's not alive anymore" since they'd probably need to recompile for each version.  Not sure it's really a regression, this is "my vendor stopped updating an add-on" which is not really a problem we can fix.

Matt, is there a v7, perhaps?

Comment 7

[Matt Grimes [:Matt_G]]

Hey Mike. Communications from HP are a bit vague here. I've asked for clarification. Hopefully v7 is in the cards.

Comment 8

[3ric]

checked under FireFox plug-ins (shift+ctrl+a) and changed the option for 'simple pass 6.0.100.276' from Ask To Active to Always Active

Comment 9

[Sylvestre Ledru [:Sylvestre]]

Matt, any news from HP?

Comment 10

[Matt Grimes [:Matt_G]]

None. The email chains with HP just died out. I'll bump again today.

Comment 11

[Sylvestre Ledru [:Sylvestre]]

Like 30, Wontfix for 31.

Comment 12

[Floyd Winkler]

Pushing the issue back to HP doesn't make sense here when there is an existing Add-On that worked with FireFox, and then FireFox is "updated" and there is no change to the existing Add-On(HP SimplePass).  When the Add-On stops working, the issue is pushed back to HP when it was FireFox that changed.  HP SimplePass works with every other product including Internet Explorer yet with FireFox it stopped all of the sudden (for the third time).  This is a FireFox issue, not the Add-On and we need resolution here :-)

Comment 14

[Gingerbread Man]

Bug 1197247 suggests that the add-on used to work prior to Firefox 40. Since the issue described is the same and it's being addressed here, it seems sensible to mark it as a duplicate of this.

Comment 15

[Jorge Villalobos [:jorgev] (he/him)]

Mass-closing bugs that relate to legacy versions of add-ons or are otherwise no longer worth tracking. Please comment if you think this bug should be reopened.

Sorry for the bugspam. Made you look, though!