I have manually installed a newer version of widevine into my profile and it resolves this issue. I will wait for the user who actually figured it out to correct their response so that it reaches the BTS. They are able to explain the source of the problem far better than I could. It seems that the problem is due to some sort of upstream service that matches components with particular FF versions, it seems to think the old widevine that 60.4 installed will also work with 60.5 and it does not.
- Bug#921121: 60.5.0esr-1~deb9u1 breaks Netflix playback Kathryn Tolsen
- Bug#921121: the wrong version of widevine is being in... Kathryn Tolsen
- Bug#921121: 60.5.0esr-1~deb9u1 breaks Netflix playbac... Sven Eckelmann
- Bug#921121: 60.5.0esr-1~deb9u1 breaks Netflix pla... Herr Middemuell
- Bug#921121: reported upstream franckr