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Google Chrome’s plan to limit ad blocking extensions kicks off next week

Reminder to switch browsers if you haven’t already!

  • Google Chrome is starting to phase out older, more capable ad blocking extensions in favor of the more limited Manifest V3 system.
  • The Manifest V3 system has been criticized by groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation for restricting the capabilities of web extensions.
  • Google has made concessions to Manifest V3, but limitations on content filtering remain a source of skepticism and concern.
nutsack ,

it’s all inevitable. client signatures, the end of privacy, jerking off on my way home from the office. there is no God

meep_launcher ,

We killed god and replaced it with Google.

snownyte ,

Can’t care, I’m on Firefox and LibreWolf. Google Chrome is only used when I need to go on some sites that don’t somehow operate correctly on Firefox to pay bills with.

kyle ,

To my shame, I’m still deeply ingrained in the Google ecosystem. I settled on it like 8-10 years ago and I’m not sure how to dig myself out of this pit. More than Chrome, I heavily use Docs, Sheets, Drive, Wallet, YouTube, Gmail, I even have a Pixel (I hate how bloated Samsung is).

I’ve used Firefox a little for work because of the nice containers feature. Is Google Drive bad too? It’s so easy to share things, I torrent a lot of books and I’ve shared with a bunch of friends, idk if there’s an alternative that others could easily use.

AnActOfCreation OP ,
@AnActOfCreation@programming.dev avatar

Don’t fret, I think a lot of us are on a long-term journey to de-Google. I’ve actually found that changing browsers is one of the easiest things to do, especially with the ability to import your bookmarks and such. With Firefox Sync, you pretty much have the same functionality as you would with your Google account signed into Chrome.

TipRing ,

Gmail is probably the hardest one to kick. I’m fine with paying for an email service if it’s functional and doesn’t siphon my personal data, but finding a quality trustworthy provider and then migrating 20 years of data to it seems so overwhelming.

sugar_in_your_tea ,

Why do you need to migrate 20 years of data? Do you actually look at anything more than a month or two old?

That said, Protonmail has “Easy Switch” to copy emails and whatnot.

The harder part for me is Drive, since there just isn’t a competitor that’s anywhere near as good in terms of overall experience. I’m going to try out OnlyOffice, but I know there are a few features I just won’t have anymore.

TipRing ,

I do occasionally need something from 10 or even 15 years ago, needing the exact date I sold a property or started a new project or even just jogging my memory of an old contact I am reaching again. While none of this is strictly necessary, I could make do without it if I had to, it does create inertia.

I really need to check out Proton, Google is just getting worse and worse and the sooner I can get away from their ecosystem the better.

sugar_in_your_tea ,

Give it a shot! Worst case scenario, you just go back.

AnActOfCreation OP ,
@AnActOfCreation@programming.dev avatar

I think migrating is the hardest part. My email history has a lot of important records and notes that I don’t want to lose.

By the way, I recommend checking out this video, which makes a great point that email is inherently insecure, regardless of the provider you choose.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH626CXyNtE

RichieRich ,
@RichieRich@lemmy.world avatar

Why do you need to access 20 years of data in Gmail? For archiving mails there is a cost-free tool called MailStore Home. It’s portable and fits on a USB thumb drive. Save two or more copies for data safety.

www.mailstore.com/en/products/mailstore-home/

So you can archive your mails without a hassle. Then you can choose any provider you want.

ghost_towels ,

Oh my gosh thank you!! I need this exact thing but hadn’t gotten around to figuring out a solution. Much appreciated!!

ruse8145 ,

Several practical solutions here but the simplest is probably to start with thunderbird on your home computer. That way storage limit shouldn’t be a worry and you can see if you find it searchable/usable enough. If so, you can do a Google takeout as a long term canonical archive, do a thunderbird backup to easily switch computers when the time comes, and then sign up for a privacy friendly service.

I bought into proton for a bit but am very very against how they bundled their services and switched my mail to posteo, which i have had no issues with in the last 1.5 years or so. Tutanota was fine but firmly a third place opt for me. I also prefer posteo because I’m anti-magic: posteo has tons of options which can get you to same or better security than proton, but it doesn’t “just work” like protons security does. Both are great.

sugar_in_your_tea ,

Here’s what I did:

  1. switch to Firefox - works with all the Google crap, so it’s an easy switch
  2. get a slim wallet - I don’t need Google Wallet at all anymore, I just keep the two cards I use for everything easily accessible
  3. install GrapheneOS on my Pixel phone - can install sandboxed Google crap if you want (I do it in a separate profile)
  4. YouTube - install ad-block and use Grayjay on my phone to make it easier to watch non-YouTube channels
  5. forward all gmail to a new account (I picked Tuta, but Protonmail is probably better for most) - easy to configure forwards in gmail, and then I just give out my new email to family and friends; plan is to keep gmail for spam once I’m no longer getting important emails sent to my new email

I’m still stuck with Google Drive though. As you said, it’s just so convenient. I’m trying out OnlyOffice with a self-hosted NextCloud instance, but there’s a lot of sacrifices. I have some complex spreadsheets, and switching to literally anything else loses features (I like the GOOGLEFINANCE() feature).

But yeah, I wish Google didn’t suck, they have some really convenient products, I just don’t trust them anymore.

InternetPerson ,

Restore Privacy – Alternatives to Google Products – The Big List (2024)

Emmie , (edited )

I did it by selling soul to apple completely, I mean I am not going to peddle another company but at least it isn’t google. However I can afford to throw some cash on their overpriced stuff. They suck but at least they aren’t google. I don’t use any google services right now. Not even maps. Without any cons because obviously I just use apple stuff for everything wallet etc

I could use framework laptop linux + graphene os but I need to live and thrive among ppl and also get that sweet social credit for not being a total nerd that yells about evil corps and how I have superior privacy in the basement left and right. However I would if it was socially acceptable.

jaschen ,

Are they going to do this on Edge? Please don’t judge me. I love the “Continue on Mobile” feature.

semitones ,

Firefox has this feature too, just saying

asexualchangeling , (edited )

Firefox not only let’s you view tabs from your PC on your phone, it let’s you install extensions (like ublock origin) on the mobile browser

machineLearner ,

not the ios app unfortunately, due to webkit

asexualchangeling ,

I don’t think of apple browsers as anything other than flavored safari, so I forget to count that as firefox

Demdaru ,

I overall love Edge. But when the ads come running, I’ll have to switch :/

boatsnhos931 ,

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/c6f9e222-afa5-4e69-b64b-5eb033ed2031.gif

OfficerBribe ,

Looks like they will follow Chromium so as with Chrome you have till 2025 June if you use ExtensionManifestV2Availability policy

billwashere ,

How does this affect browsers like Brave?

JackbyDev ,

Brave’s ad blocker is not an extension so it’s unaffected.

sebinspace ,

Same with Opera / Opera GX

BaardFigur ,

deleted_by_author

    •
    sebinspace ,

    I’m not recommending it. I’m saying that’s how its Adblock works.

    dan ,
    @dan@upvote.au avatar

    I miss the old Opera, back when it had its own engine. It was a really good browser. I used it from 2002 until 2012.

    TWeaK ,

    I remember it also let you spoof your user agent, and had a built in email client. It was just generally feature rich.

    dan ,
    @dan@upvote.au avatar

    Later versions had a built-in BitTorrent client too. It let you not only spoof the user agent, but it let you disable images, disable JS, block content, and a bunch of other settings per site.

    It showed a loading progress bar indicating how much of the page content had loaded.

    It had an option to only show images that were already cached - useful on very slow connections and better than just turning off all images.

    It had mouse gestures for going back/forward, opening new tabs, etc. Oh yeah, it was the first browser to ever implement tabbed browsing.

    They had an experiment where you could run decentralized services directly within the browser, called Opera Unite: howtogeek.com/…/turn-your-computer-into-a-file-mu…. They were trying to bring the web back to its original form, where everyone hosted their own content.

    All of this was built-in, and yet it was somehow lighter (in terms of RAM usage) than other browsers?

    They were truly innovating. We just don’t see a lot of software doing that any more. So many companies these days are trying to figure out how to extract more of your personal data and show you more ads.

    TWeaK ,

    Don’t recommend Brave either lol.

    KonalaKoala ,
    @KonalaKoala@lemmy.world avatar

    I think LibreWolf is going to end up being the go-to browser at this rate.

    pyre ,

    since people here are more tech savvy than i could ever be if like to ask what you guys think of Vivaldi, because i like it a lot. super customizable, has quick command search, side panel lets me use some websites like extensions, and workspaces help me organize especially with work… has anyone used it and can anyone tell me if waterfox or other forks are better and how?

    PlexSheep ,
    • another chromium
    • GUI looks good
    • Cross platform
    • Highdpi kind of sucks on plasma 5
    • Fast
    • Not Firefox

    I tried it for a week, but eventually left back for Firefox.

    MonkderDritte ,

    Vivaldi is the new Opera, right?

    Murdoc ,

    If by Opera you mean as it was back in version 12 before it got sold to some chinese company and completely changed, then yes. Nothing to do with what opera is now.

    m_hrstv ,

    Vivaldi is cool af and I used it for a few years but ditched it for firefox the minute i read about manifest v3(2 years ago? don’t remember). Not the devs’ fault but I’ll be damned if i allow ads on my devices.

    pyre ,

    is that guaranteed to force all chromium browsers regardless? like, does that ban the ublock origin extension (or something to the effect of rendering it useless)?

    NatoBoram ,
    @NatoBoram@mastodon.social avatar

    It does! However, uBlock Origin has a "Lite" version that works with Manifest v3.

    https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home

    pyre ,

    wow. ok. time to experiment with Firefox forks.

    m_hrstv ,

    Yeah, all chromium-based browsers will be affected, sadly.

    airglow ,

    If Vivaldi were free and open source, it would make an interesting alternative to Ungoogled Chromium. But it’s not, so I’ll stick with extensions on Firefox (and Ungoogled Chromium as a backup).

    Murdoc ,

    It is source-available though, so that’s a plus.

    airglow ,

    According to Vivaldi’s blog post “Why isn’t Vivaldi’s browser open-source?”, all of Vivaldi’s UI is closed source and not source-available:

    Note that, of the three layers above, only the UI layer is closed-source. Roughly 92% of the browser’s code is open source coming from Chromium, 3% is open source coming from us, which leaves only 5% for our UI closed-source code.

    Keeping Vivaldi’s UI layer closed-source and obfuscated allows us to set these worries aside, so we can focus on the job at hand. It may not be a perfect solution, but as a business, we have to make decisions that minimize uncertainty, if only for our self respect as employees – and employee-owners.

    The UI is the main thing that differentiates Vivaldi from Chromium, and Vivaldi chose to keep it closed source and obfuscated for business reasons. That’s a negative compared to Firefox and Ungoogled Chromium.

    Murdoc ,

    Huh, hadn’t seen that bit before, thanks for that. Ok, well that is disappointing. I did notice this bit in there too though:

    What about security benefits? Even though most of the security-relevant code for Vivaldi browser is in Chromium, there is also some security-relevant code in the UI. If you think that specific security-relevant parts of the UI should be open-sourced to make Vivaldi more trustworthy, let us know, and we’ll consider putting it out as part of our code bundles, so you can check it for yourselves.

    It not much consolation, but it’s better than nothing. As it stands though, FF still has too many problems for me. I’ll have to see how this ad blocking thing shakes out though, might have to revisit my decision then.

    kamen ,

    As a long time user of Opera (from before they went with Chromium), I’ve been using Vivaldi as my primary browser since they first released a public preview. It has its downsides (i.e. the UI is slightly slower than that of Chrome), but at the same time it’s the thing that feels most “at home” for me after migrating away from the joke Opera has become. The developers seem to hold a strong anti-manifest-v3 stance, but unfortunately at one point they might have to comply. I just tried the built-in blocker instead of uBlock Origin I normally use and it seems to do a pretty good job.

    I get the whole “switch to Firefox” thing; for me the major blocker is that it doesn’t have global mouse gestures and this messes up with my muscle memory. If they add that, I might give Firefox another chance.

    HonorableScythe ,

    I’d be glad to switch back to Firefox, but websites straight up don’t work on it anymore. That was the only reason I went to Chrome.

    fuzzzerd ,

    What websites? I use Firefox as my daily driver on desktop and mobile, and I rarely run into problems. Like so infrequently that I don’t even remember the last time.

    TexasDrunk ,

    Same. My Dark Reader doesn’t always show websites properly but Firefox hasn’t let me down in ages.

    QuestionMark ,

    Some websites display warnings even though everything works fine, like web.skype.com. But that’s the closest thing to doesn’t work I’ve ever seen on Firefox.

    EtherWhack , (edited )
    @EtherWhack@lemmy.world avatar

    They are around… Try this one: (www.starbirdchicken.com/starbird-chicken-menu)

    I was curious of what their menu looked like as I have one by my work. Haven’t checked it on desktop, but on Android, the menu items never get loaded. ($10-12 for an á la carte chicken sandwich from a fast casual place is a ripoff anyway)

    Edit: It looks like it’s the mobile site/formatting that is broken. Using desktop mode lets the menu items come onto screen. (Firefox 126.01 on a pixel8pro with Android 14) The same issue seems to also be present with chrome under my work account.

    I still argue that they are present, as I had to with it doing taxes a couple months ago. (Just not going to give those sites away)

    Metz ,

    works flawless here on Android 14 with Firefox 126.0.1. not tested desktop yet.

    Womble ,

    Works perfectly for me on desktop with firefox

    airglow ,

    No problems loading that page on Firefox for Android or desktop for me. Are you using Firefox or a fork of Firefox? Do you have any extensions or about:config changes that may be affecting the page rendering?

    grue ,

    That’s a reason to insist on Firefox even harder. Fuck those websites!

    viking ,
    @viking@infosec.pub avatar

    I’ve yet to find a single website that doesn’t work in Firefox.

    cmnybo ,

    There are some sites out there that won’t work. ESC Configurator won’t work in Firefox because it needs web serial to program an ESC connected over a serial port. That’s the only site I use that I have to run in chrome. I’m sure there are more out there, but they are not very common.

    brbposting ,

    I encourage those in this situation to do their small, small part in fighting for the future of the open web by only switching to Chrome when necessary.

    Which is almost never in my daily life!

    Tag365 ,
    @Tag365@lemmy.world avatar

    How do we combat Google Chrome being Internet Explorer 2.0?

    exanime ,

    I have never encountered this… Do you have an example, just curious

    vext01 ,
    @vext01@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    Which sites? Been using Firefox since forever and all is well.

    HonorableScythe ,

    Last I tried, I had serious issues using it on Comcast’s billing pages and Quest Diagnostic’s site, among others. The pages would not load at all until I went to Chrome.

    autotldr Bot ,

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    Other groups don’t agree with Google’s description, like the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which called Manifest V3 “deceitful and threatening” back when it was first announced in 2019, saying the new system “will restrict the capabilities of web extensions—especially those that are designed to monitor, modify, and compute alongside the conversation your browser has with the websites you visit.”

    Google, which makes about 77 percent of its revenue from advertising, has not published a serious explanation as to why Manifest V3 limits content filtering, and it’s not clear how that aligns with the goals of “improving the security, privacy, performance and trustworthiness.”

    Like Kewisch said, the primary goal of malicious extensions is to spy on users and slurp up data, which has nothing to do with content filtering.

    Google now says it’s possible for extensions to skip the reviews process for “safe” rule set changes, but even this is limited to “static” rulesets, not more powerful “dynamic” ones.

    In a comment to The Verge last year, the senior staff technologist at the EFF, Alexei Miagkov, summed up Google’s public negotiations with the extension community well, saying, "These are helpful changes, but they are tweaks to a limited-by-design system.

    For a short period, users will be able to turn them back on if they visit the extension page, but Google says that “over time, this toggle will go away as well.”

    The original article contains 692 words, the summary contains 230 words. Saved 67%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

    COASTER1921 ,

    So maybe my experience is unique but websites don’t always test with Firefox now and some simply don’t work with it. I use it anyway out of principle but occasionally I need to open Chrome.

    On mobile it’s even worse. Firefox is stuttery on my Pixel 8 Pro and doesn’t handle more than ~20 open tabs well. The nightly version fixes the stutter but crashes all the time (it’s a nightly build after all so this is expected).

    iliketurtles ,

    Do you have a lot of add-ons for Firefox mobile? I’m on a pixel 7 and it is smooth with 3ish add-ons, but is slow if I have too many.

    COASTER1921 , (edited )

    Just ublock origin with default configuration. My complaints aren’t for page loading so much as scrolling. Stutter when scrolling is really annoying to me. Interestingly as mentioned the nightly version fixes this, even when ublock is also installed on it.

    My occasional page related complaints are for stuff animating correctly. This is very rare and a minor inconvenience usually, but sometimes stops you from being able to do what you came to accomplish (usually on jank websites, rental car companies for example).

    Pretending Firefox mobile is already great is counterproductive to fixing it’s issues. They don’t have extensive development resources particularly for the mobile version so it makes sense it’s worse. But to a non-techie switching to it isn’t a good experience yet. It definitely can be in the future but without at least acknowledging it’s current flaws why would anyone switch who has previously tried switching?

    Psythik ,

    This is just straight-up slander. I’ve been using Firefox since 1.0PR (so for 20 years now). It was a very rare occasion when a website wouldn’t function properly, and almost never would a website completely break. I haven’t had a single issue with a website in Firefox for over 5 years now. I would appreciate it if you could post some examples of some websites that “simply won’t work with it”, because I simply don’t believe you.

    Mobile is fine too. I have a bad habit of not closing tabs. It’s gotten so bad that the tab count number is just the infinity symbol on my phone. Still don’t have any slowdown issues on a Fold 3. Didn’t have any on my OnePlus 6T, either, nor my LG G2, nor my Galaxy S3. Quit making shit up just to have an excuse to stick with a shitty browser.

    RogueAozame ,

    Not op but moda healths find care page. It has a rapid refresh loop or just doesn’t load at all in Firefox. Chromium it works.

    MentorKitten ,

    I often have to use edge or chrome to do most if anything related to my classes or for pearson. Almost never wants to work on Firefox

    Psythik ,

    Ah yes, anything institutional or governmental tends to behind on the times when it comes to browser compatibility. Good point.

    I remember back when I tried to get assistance from my local government; the application form didn’t work unless you had IE6 (a browser that hasn’t been supported since Windows XP), in 2012.

    TheBlue22 ,

    Thank fuck I switched to mozilla

    ColdWater ,
    @ColdWater@lemmy.ca avatar

    Oh no, anyway

    sugar_in_your_tea ,

    I use Firefox and Brave at work. I need a Chromium-based browser, and Brave’s ad-blocker works, otherwise I would be Firefox only.

    ech ,

    Oh no! Wait, I don’t use that shit because of shit like this.

    enbyecho , (edited )

    This post reminded me to try out Brave. It’s based on Chromium but purports to block ads and trackers…

    Anybody else use it?

    Edit: Interesting. Anyone care to explain the downvotes? I know nothing about this browser other than it purportedly blocks Youtube ads, which are driving me nuts.

    Edit2: Well shit: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brendan_Eich

    I had no idea about this guy. Ok, so completely not an option.

    cyberic ,
    @cyberic@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

    My brother uses it, just remember to look through the ad settings. There was a toggle at one point to allow their approved ads or something like that.

    kusivittula ,

    i tried brave recently after finding out it’s open source, and that setting is off by default. ended up keeping firefox, because on android somehow the new tab page in brave is even worse than in ff. too tricky to access bookmarks.

    ruse8145 ,

    I still to this day don’t know how to get back to the tab I was on in firefox-android if I get to the new tab screen. It’s been 2 or 3 years since the redesign.

    kusivittula ,

    you need to close keyboard, hit the tab icon on the address bar and select the tab. easier way is to open some recent website and either close the current one or swipe from the address bar. it’s stupid.

    ruse8145 ,

    Sigh, thank you

    ruse8145 ,

    Iirc there was also some drama about the money they collect not going to the promised destination. Anywhere other than silicon valley this might be called fraud.

    astropenguin5 ,

    They still might be forced to follow chromium’s manifest v3 ant ad locking stuff though, we’ll just have to see.

    ruse8145 ,

    No I’m pro lgbtq folks having rights

    enbyecho , (edited )

    How does this relate to Brave browser?

    Edit: I had no idea about the CEO. So yeah, not gonna ever use that.

    ruse8145 ,

    yep :(

    very disappointing all round. on a sliding scale thats not the worst thing brave has done, but given that the entire browser was literally birthed from “we don’t want your hate here” its hard to avoid.

    RokAlamSeth ,

    Too bad for your little black and white worldview those are the same people against adblockers. The good thing is this world has sensible people like me who could give less of a fuck who’s feeling is getting hurt and only care about our browsing experience. The rest can go die for all I care.

    ruse8145 ,

    What the actual duck are you talking about? I genuinely can’t figure it out.

    RokAlamSeth ,

    filtered

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