Google is killing one of Chrome's biggest ad blockers(pcworld.com)
pcworld.com
Google is killing one of Chrome's biggest ad blockers
https://www.pcworld.com/article/2423294/google-is-killing-one-of-chromes-biggest-ad-blockers.html
109 comments
>they're "supportive" of adblockers
Same way how foxes are supportive of chicken wire.
Same way how foxes are supportive of chicken wire.
I imagine it’s a bit of both. Google doesn’t need to kill ad blockers at the browser level. Like YouTube has shown, they can just detect ad blockers and block the page from functioning.
And browser extensions being malware is more the rule than the exception. I wouldn’t be surprised if more than 50% of browser extensions are sucking up your usage data if not actively stealing credentials.
And browser extensions being malware is more the rule than the exception. I wouldn’t be surprised if more than 50% of browser extensions are sucking up your usage data if not actively stealing credentials.
Any program that doesn't allow plugins of any kind is on that regard safer than any program that does. Shutting down your computer is even safer still. Of course you need to vet the source of any software and that includes plugins.
Manifest V3 is not a net gain here, it is a protectionist move by Google.
Manifest V3 is not a net gain here, it is a protectionist move by Google.
How do you mean? For me, uBlock Origin and Firefox have worked ad-free for a long time, that with no pages blocked.
Using their browser business to artificially force the market to be more kind to their advertising business?
Google's monopoly can't get broken up soon enough.
Google's monopoly can't get broken up soon enough.
It's pretty interesting how this stuff is still going on after a judge has just ruled that it's illegal. The Microsoft monopoly case really did change the company in the sense that it made them a lot more cautious and bureaucratic even before the ruling came down.
This ruling doesn't seem to have changed anything at Google yet. Amit Mehta's comments indicate that he was nonplussed about how thoroughly and knowingly Google has been destroying evidence for years, another thing which for all their faults, Microsoft and I suspect IBM before them didn't really do, knowing that the courts would catch on sooner or later. Google is special, it's like this company is committed to criminality in its DNA.
This ruling doesn't seem to have changed anything at Google yet. Amit Mehta's comments indicate that he was nonplussed about how thoroughly and knowingly Google has been destroying evidence for years, another thing which for all their faults, Microsoft and I suspect IBM before them didn't really do, knowing that the courts would catch on sooner or later. Google is special, it's like this company is committed to criminality in its DNA.
was a pretty obvious eventuality when manifest V3 was announced. I knew I needed to jump off ASAP at that moment. They already use that leverage to reject any kinds of extensions on their store that extends on Youtube, after all.
There's no 'browser business'. How does that model work, give away free web browsers on desktop and mobile, then... It certainly helped when they were making what was needed for apps like Gmail, Docs, etc.
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But think of the poor shareholders. How will they get any returns without Google's monopoly?
Why do tech savvy people still use a browser from an ad company?
Better development tools than Firefox. In terms of usability and performance.
This isnt really true anymore. Firefox has caught up in devtools, and has superior tools when it comes to animation debugging. Performance also isn't worse than chrome, in fact I've found that FF uses a lot less memory than chrome does.
The only time I open chrome is to use an occasional WebApp that needs the Bluetooth API or something like that.
The only time I open chrome is to use an occasional WebApp that needs the Bluetooth API or something like that.
I don't think that is true today. At first Firefox had better tools but developers didn't do the smart thing and developed for Chrome.
At the time it was indeed faster, not really an issue today either. Also the writing was on the wall for quite some time.
At the time it was indeed faster, not really an issue today either. Also the writing was on the wall for quite some time.
On my 2017 Ultrabook with only 4gb of ram, Firefox stalls repeatedly & has long stretches of being entirely unresponsive after half a dozen tabs, and gets worse from there.
I have some delay where a navigation might be delayed some, but Chrome doesn't ever lose input and generally manages to keep going.
Even on a desktop with 64GB ram, Firefox gets slow over time & needs to be restarted when I have a significant number of tabs open. Tab auto-suspend extensions generally "fix" the problem, but it's been frustrating that whatever the on-page performance is in Firefox, the app itself feels so prone to bouts of unresponsiveness.
I have some delay where a navigation might be delayed some, but Chrome doesn't ever lose input and generally manages to keep going.
Even on a desktop with 64GB ram, Firefox gets slow over time & needs to be restarted when I have a significant number of tabs open. Tab auto-suspend extensions generally "fix" the problem, but it's been frustrating that whatever the on-page performance is in Firefox, the app itself feels so prone to bouts of unresponsiveness.
Please be more precise about what you mean by "significant number of tabs", is it 50, 200, 500, more ?
Because on a 16 Gb laptop, I don't have any problem with 50 tabs open with Firefox.
Used to run chrome for it too. Never understood why it should impact which browser you use for everything else ...
Better how?
voluntary subjugation
If Firefox market share would drop to sub 1%, Google would face some difficult to dissuade monopoly allegations. I believe it's one of the reasons Mozilla gets founded by Google, they get to point to an alternative. Then again without Mozilla we might now live in a WEI world, which I certainly would prefer not to.
WEI world?
Web Environment Integrity aka. WEI. I recommend this article that gives a holistic explanation on the context that proposal sits in: https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-de...
Same as non-tech saavy. They may try to get around it, but convinience still trumps customizability and control for many. That's why there's still a signifigant IOS/Mac OS even among techies.
Chrome isn’t installed by default, what convenience are you talking about?
And iOS/Mac analogy isn’t holding here, because Firefox is a drop in replacement for Chrome. Not in a sense select either customization or convenience, but select both.
And iOS/Mac analogy isn’t holding here, because Firefox is a drop in replacement for Chrome. Not in a sense select either customization or convenience, but select both.
Maybe it changed recently, but using Google on non-chrome will pester you about being chrome. So it's not exactly hidden either.
>what convenience are you talking about?
Largest extension support, built in integrations for stuff like casting, translation, image search, etc. It also just seems to have less quirks than Firefox. Not anything game breaking, but fiddling with video calls or tab groups or a half dozen more small features is a lot more intuitive on chrome than Firefox. Even if some of it is just outright incompetence (or malice), like abusing user agents.
It's no single thing, but they all add up.
>And iOS/Mac analogy isn’t holding here, because Firefox is a drop in replacement for Chrome.
In the superficial sense, sure. If you just need to go to 10 websites and need maybe 3 key extentions you'll be fine. Power users will see many subtle differences overtime. You can technically use both, but typically you will spend most time on a selected browser of choice.
>what convenience are you talking about?
Largest extension support, built in integrations for stuff like casting, translation, image search, etc. It also just seems to have less quirks than Firefox. Not anything game breaking, but fiddling with video calls or tab groups or a half dozen more small features is a lot more intuitive on chrome than Firefox. Even if some of it is just outright incompetence (or malice), like abusing user agents.
It's no single thing, but they all add up.
>And iOS/Mac analogy isn’t holding here, because Firefox is a drop in replacement for Chrome.
In the superficial sense, sure. If you just need to go to 10 websites and need maybe 3 key extentions you'll be fine. Power users will see many subtle differences overtime. You can technically use both, but typically you will spend most time on a selected browser of choice.
How is Chrome more convenient than Firefox?
It works well. I've got at least four browsers installed on the macbook and use the one that works best and don't really give any consideration to stuff like whether the company does ads.
I've got chrome and firefox with ublock installed. If chrome gets ad plastered I'll probably go firefox more. I presently get forced back to chrome if there's a foreign language comment on X/itter. I haven't figured how to translate those on ff.
I've got chrome and firefox with ublock installed. If chrome gets ad plastered I'll probably go firefox more. I presently get forced back to chrome if there's a foreign language comment on X/itter. I haven't figured how to translate those on ff.
Obviously because there is no immediate punishment from it. Eventually your NSA clone will replicate your behaviour exactly, but before that you don't get punished and make the mistake of continuing the behaviour.
Some web apps are optimized for Chrome or even require Chrome. Though most of the apps I use don't have ads. I use Firefox for general browsing, and occasionally Chrome for development or for using trusted apps.
Because the other browsers are all still Chrome or mandated by The One Apple Way(tm).
Except for that one browser which isn't, we don't use that because they go out of their way to tell tech savvy people to screw off.
Except for that one browser which isn't, we don't use that because they go out of their way to tell tech savvy people to screw off.
I'm absolutly disappointed in Mozilla leadership.
But I just don't understand how it could even compare to Google ...
But I just don't understand how it could even compare to Google ...
This. It was basically us killing internet explorer by giving first firefox and later chrome to friends and family. We made sure 'our' sites were compatible.
A zillion insects can swallow an elephant.
A zillion insects can swallow an elephant.
Are you suggesting Firefox? If so, that sounds strange given Mozilla acquired ads business in the beginning of this year.
Call me when Firefox stops supporting manifest v2 and thus crippling ad blockers. Until then I use Firefox and will be very content doing so, recommending it to everyone who asks as well.
You can't both-sides this.
Any ad business Mozilla can "acquire" is a percentage of a fraction of the global juggernaut that is Google.
Any ad business Mozilla can "acquire" is a percentage of a fraction of the global juggernaut that is Google.
On one side you have Mozilla with it's experiments that can be disabled on the other Google. Yeah sure it's the same ...
YouTube on Firefox is completely bricked, so it forces Chrome usage.
I use youtube over 30 times a day in firefox the passed year without issue.
maybe there is problem with your setup? because i do use youtube on firefox without a problem (+ublock and +vpn) and i don't see advertisement. though, of course my main gate to youtube is FreeTube.
I also use ublock + vpn. Do a quick Google search for "reddit + firefox + youtube not working", you'll see that strings are getting posted much more frequently over the past six months.
Probably some form of A/B testing. I used to say the same thing, but specific channels and specific live-streams will now die every 30 seconds using FF+uBlock. I found they appear to do testing on channels they do not like such as those that complain about YT's policy and other channels for reasons I shall not speak of here.
youtube on firefox works just fine for me. can you describe this means it’s bricked?
Videos play for 10 seconds then stop loading, forced reduced quality, and just generally buggy in several different ways. Many Reddit strings with tons of other people having similar issues.
- https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1dgodfn/youtube_on... - https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1cjbsmj/youtube_on... - https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1bsc0i4/youtube_no...
- https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1dgodfn/youtube_on... - https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1cjbsmj/youtube_on... - https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/1bsc0i4/youtube_no...
I'm a constant firefox youtube user, hours a day at least, for years, I've had no problems at all. Is this actual FUD?
I was thinking, uBlock is getting "isolated" to Firefox, since sooner or later all chromium based browsers will face challenges with removal of manifest v3 code.
However, one thing that could be done is integrate uBlock into a chromium based browser. The removal of manifest v3 would still be painful, but uBlock would survive and we get a browser with exceptional ad blocking capabilities builtin
However, one thing that could be done is integrate uBlock into a chromium based browser. The removal of manifest v3 would still be painful, but uBlock would survive and we get a browser with exceptional ad blocking capabilities builtin
Ideally someone could create their own spec to replace or supplement declarativeNetRequest in mv3. And ideally write specifications to support that.
Rather than hardcode one extension in, re-open the gate to privacy protecting extensions having a lot of tools at their disposal.
There's nothing to stop other people from making specs! The main barrier is that there's such a a limited pool of people willing to go implement.
Rather than hardcode one extension in, re-open the gate to privacy protecting extensions having a lot of tools at their disposal.
There's nothing to stop other people from making specs! The main barrier is that there's such a a limited pool of people willing to go implement.
> Ideally someone could create their own spec to replace or supplement declarativeNetRequest in mv3. And ideally write specifications to support that.
Or include it in MV3. Firefox's implementation for MV3 avoids this problem almost entirely by just not getting rid of the specification and integrating it into the new system.
There are technical problems with MV3 in Firefox (it's extraordinarily buggy right now), but my suspicion is that by the time it matures it will be a straight-up improvement over MV2 for both privacy and capability (especially if Firefox ever gets around to supporting extension service workers).
It's not really MV3 that's the problem, it's specifically Google's implementation of it and which APIs they've chosen not to include.
The downside for other browsers based on Chromium is that even if they go Firefox's route, they're all largely dependent on the Chrome web store for extensions, and I think it's unlikely that most extension developers continue to develop Chromium extensions that don't work in Chrome.
Or include it in MV3. Firefox's implementation for MV3 avoids this problem almost entirely by just not getting rid of the specification and integrating it into the new system.
There are technical problems with MV3 in Firefox (it's extraordinarily buggy right now), but my suspicion is that by the time it matures it will be a straight-up improvement over MV2 for both privacy and capability (especially if Firefox ever gets around to supporting extension service workers).
It's not really MV3 that's the problem, it's specifically Google's implementation of it and which APIs they've chosen not to include.
The downside for other browsers based on Chromium is that even if they go Firefox's route, they're all largely dependent on the Chrome web store for extensions, and I think it's unlikely that most extension developers continue to develop Chromium extensions that don't work in Chrome.
I'm not against that, but there is no guarantee that Chromium will implement such new spec either, right?
My suggestion was to get a new browser up and running with good quality ad blocking
My suggestion was to get a new browser up and running with good quality ad blocking
Doesn't le shill lion, aka Brave, already do that?
No, Brave does not integrate uBO. It has its own ad blocker that is somewhat inferior.
Brave does integrate uBO. It can be activated under "manifest v2 extensions" in the settings.
KingOfCoders(1)
Switch to firefox
Firefox will also switch to manifest v3, although Mozilla claims they will use non-inferior api. Only Brave may never be affected, because it uses a native built-in ad blocker.
Not sure if I missed something but as far as I'm aware there is no plan to remove v2 support: https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2024/03/13/manifest-v3-manif...
And I doubt it will happen but if by some miracle people were switching to Firefox due to v2 phase out in chrome it might send a strong signal to keep supporting it.
And I doubt it will happen but if by some miracle people were switching to Firefox due to v2 phase out in chrome it might send a strong signal to keep supporting it.
No, they won't keep it. They have a long history of crippling add-ons. If they did all that when Google wasn't funding them, they can't possibly oppose Google now.
I'm already using Manifest V3 in Firefox for a few personal private addons that I develop, and I can confirm that blocking network requests already work perfectly fine in it. The only issues I have with Manifest V3 in Firefox are technical, I haven't noticed any issues that I think are problems of direction.
Firefox's Manifest V3 implementation arguably isn't ready for prime time (it has some pretty egregious bugs), but whenever they finally do get around to dropping Manifest V2 (which I have no idea when that would happen), I'm not really worried about extensions not being able to jump over.
Firefox's Manifest V3 implementation arguably isn't ready for prime time (it has some pretty egregious bugs), but whenever they finally do get around to dropping Manifest V2 (which I have no idea when that would happen), I'm not really worried about extensions not being able to jump over.
Or Edge. Or Safari. Or one of the new Chromium based browsers.
Basically anything but Chrome.
Basically anything but Chrome.
Edge is also ditching Manifest V2 and embracing V3.
This is the extension API change at the heart of the problem.
Any browser based on the Chrome engine has to expend energy to hold to V2 support while embracing the latest engine developments.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/extensions-...
This is the extension API change at the heart of the problem.
Any browser based on the Chrome engine has to expend energy to hold to V2 support while embracing the latest engine developments.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/extensions-...
KingOfCoders(1)
At this point, why do extension/plugin authors bother to comply with ManifestV3 anyway? Just inject into chrome.exe and tinker with those network ABIs directly. Just like the good ol' days.
https://github.com/tycrek/degoogle
A good read. It's fun exploring and tinkering with all the softwares out there.
A good read. It's fun exploring and tinkering with all the softwares out there.
Great? Please block your way to irrelevancy Google, and take your browser with you.
Discussion (169 points, 9 days ago, 43 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41140185
> When that happens, uBlock Origin fans will need to find a different ad blocker… or a different web browser.
Sheep will still continue using Chrome despite their interests being stomped upon.
Sheep will still continue using Chrome despite their interests being stomped upon.
I don’t know… making it super hard to block ads will become a huge deal for those who wish to block them.
> or a different web browser.
It's time, if you haven't already.
It's time, if you haven't already.
With the track record of Google, I'd love to see people so annoyed by ads starting a movement to switch to other browsers, essentially rendering Google shooting themselves in their foot with this move, starting Google's downfall in terms of browser dominance (and many others).
I haven’t followed this but it sounds like the internet is about to become unbearable from chrome.
Does this affect firefox? If so, what alternatives are there? (I know of brave but heard it’s not so good). Perhaps safari? But it feels quite different to chrome and Firefox and will take some getting used to.
Does this affect firefox? If so, what alternatives are there? (I know of brave but heard it’s not so good). Perhaps safari? But it feels quite different to chrome and Firefox and will take some getting used to.
The obvious solution is to build a complete browser compiled in WASM and release it as a Chrome extension.
This new in-browser-browser can then have a good support for stuff like uBlock Origine or whatever else one pleases.
This way you still use chrome while making chrome irrelevant.
This new in-browser-browser can then have a good support for stuff like uBlock Origine or whatever else one pleases.
This way you still use chrome while making chrome irrelevant.
Or just don’t use chrome anymore
Why not just fork chrome? Or use Firefox?
Firefox will drop support too. They can't oppose Google.
All other browsers and forks will be unsupported by all major frameworks, CMSs, Discord forums, etc. It will be like trying to browse the web with links/lynx.
All other browsers and forks will be unsupported by all major frameworks, CMSs, Discord forums, etc. It will be like trying to browse the web with links/lynx.
Time to start using Brave then?
If I'm not mistaken, Brave is based on Chromium, so it's likely that they'll be subject to the same changes.
Brave includes an ad-blocker that is not restricted to using the extension API.
Yes, but they modify it to build adblock in, so one does not need to install a separate plugin.
It’s not in any way comparable to uBlock, which is very customizable, and has a large community behind it working on the cat and mouse game.
One does not choose web browsers on adblocking capabilities alone. Some may need Chromium features that FF do not have, so it’s nice to have options, even if one specific feature (i.e., adblock) is just 80-90% as good as the other.
I choose a web browser based on ad blocking capabilities alone.
If I want to do development I can do that in a different browser. Web developers should have all major web browsers installed anyway.
If I want to do development I can do that in a different browser. Web developers should have all major web browsers installed anyway.
> Web developers should have all major web browsers installed anyway.
Agree. Even if not a web developer, one can use different browsers for different purposes at the same time.
Agree. Even if not a web developer, one can use different browsers for different purposes at the same time.
Like what? I use Chrome and FF and I can't really see a difference, other than one has advertisements the other does not.
ublock even blocks YouTube video ads.
The new server side rendered ads are not blocked on firefox though
Yeah, the built-in blocker in Brave does, too.
Anyone got a deep dive link (or willing to deep dive in a comment here) on how the best adblockers actually work?
I'm assuming it's not simply a DNS blacklist, correct? There must be more to it than simply blocking known domains.
I'm assuming it's not simply a DNS blacklist, correct? There must be more to it than simply blocking known domains.
I don't have a deep dive, but my understanding is that previous to Manifest V3 or Safari's content blocking extensions from years ago, it was a Javascript free-for-all. Extensions could run code on each network request, extensions could modify the DOM, they could do basically anything. This wasn't great for a number of reasons, including privacy, security, and energy performance on mobile devices.
Safari moved to a model for content blocking where the extensions could provide a list of domains, maybe regexes for elements or something, offline, then this would be "precompiled" in some way, and all rules from all extensions would be applied directly by the browser in a way that was faster and didn't disclose information about the things being blocked to the extensions.
My understanding of Manifest V3's controversial change is that is basically does this for Chrome.
Why is this a problem for uBlock? Because it does limit functionality a little more. You can't have the user directly pick apart the page in the same way, and blocking lists are of limited size. However Safari extensions have already worked around this by providing their own out-of-band user-defined blocking interfaces, and using multiple blocking lists, I'm not sure if that's possible with MV3. uBlock is one of the more feature-complete ad-blocking extensions, with a community of people who probably use those features more than average, so they're more impacted.
Whether it really ends up restricting the feature set that much I think remains to be seen. It might take more work to make those features work, but I expect the vast majority of users install adblockers and never think about them again, so perhaps that isn't necessary.
Disclaimer, I work at Google, but not on anything related to this. I use uBlock Origin on Chrome currently, and 1Blocker on iOS for Safari.
Safari moved to a model for content blocking where the extensions could provide a list of domains, maybe regexes for elements or something, offline, then this would be "precompiled" in some way, and all rules from all extensions would be applied directly by the browser in a way that was faster and didn't disclose information about the things being blocked to the extensions.
My understanding of Manifest V3's controversial change is that is basically does this for Chrome.
Why is this a problem for uBlock? Because it does limit functionality a little more. You can't have the user directly pick apart the page in the same way, and blocking lists are of limited size. However Safari extensions have already worked around this by providing their own out-of-band user-defined blocking interfaces, and using multiple blocking lists, I'm not sure if that's possible with MV3. uBlock is one of the more feature-complete ad-blocking extensions, with a community of people who probably use those features more than average, so they're more impacted.
Whether it really ends up restricting the feature set that much I think remains to be seen. It might take more work to make those features work, but I expect the vast majority of users install adblockers and never think about them again, so perhaps that isn't necessary.
Disclaimer, I work at Google, but not on anything related to this. I use uBlock Origin on Chrome currently, and 1Blocker on iOS for Safari.
Might answer part of the question but there is some info on what's not supported in ubol lite vs origin: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/wiki/Frequently-as...
I've read that there is a ublock for manifest v3
Is that new ublock less capable?
Is that new ublock less capable?
Yes, uBlock minus (or maybe uBlock lite? A quick web search returns both in a way that suggests a rename) works on v3, and yes it's less capable (off the top of my head, I believe it couldn't take as many rules, probably couldn't do as precise of rules, and couldn't do anything about domain fronting).
Whike it's less capable than manifest2 version it is still much more capable than pihole or other dns based blockers.
https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home
https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home
firefox users unaffected. :-D
Unaffected for now. Firefox is run by ads company and Firefox will also switch to manifest v3.
Microsoft's decision to bundle IE with Windows was considered a monopoly. Similarly, Google's move to kill off Chrome's extensions for ad revenue is comparable to Microsoft's actions.
https://github.com/w3c/webextensions/blob/56dc974e5d583d6989...
https://github.com/w3c/webextensions/blob/01ac3748984f31885c...