The Best Firefox 90 Features to Know About
After a major overhaul of Firefox 89, the upgrade to version 90 looks comparatively timid. But it focuses on two important things – privacy and tracker blocking. If you’re a fan of Firefox and its unwavering mission to protect your privacy and automatically block trackers, you’ll love this update.
To update to the latest version, open the Firefox app and go to Settings> General> Firefox Updates> Check for Updates . Firefox is also rolling out the version 90 update for Android, which you can get from the Google Play store . Here’s what’s new in Firefox 90.
SmartBlock 2.0 works with your Facebook login
The Firefox 90 update has improved SmartBlock, a tracker blocking feature for private browsing and strict mode. You can now use Facebook to log into sites privately while still blocking cross-site tracking. If you were using a previous version of Firefox, the browser would block the Facebook login request because it went through its tracking servers.
Now, when you try to log in with Facebook, Firefox will recognize this and temporarily allow it (for the login process only). Once this is done, cross-site tracking will be blocked again.
Background updates for Windows
This update also introduces the background updates feature for Windows computers, which will check, download, and install any pending updates in the background (checks every seven hours).
Firefox is rolling out this feature gradually and you can enable it in the settings.
1. Press the ” Menu” button and go to ” Settings” .
2. In the General section, scroll down to the Firefox Updates section .
3. Here, enable the ” Install updates automatically (recommended)” option and select or uncheck the ” When Firefox is not running” checkbox, depending on your needs.
Add and sync credit cards
Firefox also now lets you add and sync credit cards to your Firefox account (on your computer and Android app). This information is encrypted in your account and will be available on all your devices.
Changes in Firefox for Android
As far as Android is concerned, Firefox has changed the interface in the settings. You now see a large banner at the top prompting you to set Firefox as your default browser, and there is a new section for adding credit cards.
Firefox 90 also adds reverse / forward caching functionality for supported websites, so you can navigate between web pages faster.
Technical changes
This update removes FTP completely: earlier you could enable File Transfer Protocol using a flag, but now this is not possible. This means you need to use a dedicated browser like FileZilla to access FTP servers.
It should also be noted that a new ” About Third Party Software ” page has been added to help you manage compatibility issues with third party applications. Exceptions from HTTPS-only mode can be managed in “about: preferences # privacy.”