1433500 - detectportal.firefox.com should return something informative for "real" user agents.

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Core :: Networking, enhancement, P3)

Description

[Mike Hoye [:mhoye]]

Right now, browsing to detectportal.firefox.com returns only "success". 

For some users - particularly non-english-native-speaking users - the purpose of  detectportal.firefox.com may be unclear, and I've heard a report that people are concerned about the nature of that ping from a privacy and security perspective.

I propose that we append a (shortened?) link to an appropriate SUMO page about what detectportal.firefox.com is and does to success.txt.

Comment 1

[Honza Bambas (:mayhemer)]

Tentatively giving to Valentin as a maintainer of that code.

Comment 3

[Valentin Gosu [:valentin] (he/him) {{ AFK in July }}]

Steps:

• Add a new file canonical.html to the storage bucket containing <meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=http://mzl.la/cp"/>
• Change the captivedetect.canonicalContent to <meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=http://mzl.la/cp"/>
• Change captivedetect.canonicalURL to http://detectportal.firefox.com/canonical.html
• Make http://mzl.la/cp redirect to a Mozilla support page explaining captive portals.

Follow-up steps:

• Change domain from detectportal.firefox.com to a TLD so we don't have to worry about HSTS on firefox.com
• Change network.connectivity-service.IPv4.url and http://detectportal.firefox.com/canonical.html?ipv4`
• Change network.connectivity-service.IPv6.url and http://detectportal.firefox.com/canonical.html?ipv6`
• Eventually remove success.txt when it is not used (or simply decomission detectportal.firefox.com)

Comment 4

[Valentin Gosu [:valentin] (he/him) {{ AFK in July }}]

Attachment: Bug 1433500 - detectportal.firefox.com should return something informative for users r=nhnt11

This change constitutes a way we can redirect users to an actual page that
explains what captive portals are and why we are making these requests.
Normally users should not see this page, as we only compare the contents
of a small html file. The meta redirect only happens when loaded in a
page.

The http://mzl.la/cp redirect is controlled via the bit.ly URL shortner.

Comment 5

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/153bb20062aa
detectportal.firefox.com should return something informative for users r=nhnt11

Comment 6

[Atila Butkovits]

Backed out for causing failure on test_captive_portal_service.js

Backout link: https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/b532729e3b07852d862528e03b597974948d7b7e

Push with failures: https://treeherder.mozilla.org/jobs?repo=autoland&searchStr=linux%2C18.04%2Cx64%2Casan%2Copt%2Cxpcshell%2Ctests%2Ctest-linux1804-64-asan%2Fopt-xpcshell-e10s%2Cx2&revision=153bb20062aa8b943cd37988723942ecd9ae35f2&selectedTaskRun=ITe06iSHSRSXS-H1ORnVBA.0

Failure log: https://treeherder.mozilla.org/logviewer?job_id=334538770&repo=autoland&lineNumber=2970

Comment 7

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/2fcbc72daec5
detectportal.firefox.com should return something informative for users r=nhnt11,extension-reviewers,zombie

Comment 8

[Bogdan Tara[:bogdan_tara | bogdant]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/2fcbc72daec5