Google’s Chrome extension cull hits more uBlock Origin users - USE FUCKING BRAVE

Google is disabling the original uBlock Origin ad blocker for more Chrome browser users, alongside other extensions that are no longer supported as the browser migrates to its new extension specification, Manifest V3. According to Google, the new standard aims to improve privacy and security, but also removes a feature that some ad blocking extensions relied on to work — a compromise that Mozilla is unwilling to make for its own Firefox browser.

Users online are reporting on Reddit and X that Chrome is removing outdated extensions. In Chrome, a notification window will appear underneath the extensions tab on the browser taskbar with a message encouraging users to remove the impacted add-on, saying it has been turned off and is “no longer supported.” Two buttons are available that allow users to either quickly delete or manage their extensions.

Google’s uBlock Origin phaseout on Chromium-based browsers began in October, but started to have a wider impact in recent weeks. Bleeping Computer has also reported that extensions on staffers devices are being turned off, and Verge staffers have seen similar updates on our own machines.

These changes come as Google migrates Chrome away from the now defunct Manifest V2 specification. Support is being killed not just for uBlock Origin, but for any extension that hasn’t (or is unable to) update to Manifest V3. uBlock Origin users can switch to uBlock Origin Lite, which has more limited filtering capabilities than its predecessor due to Manifest V3’s ad blocking restrictions.

Chrome won’t be the only service affected by the Manifest V3 rollout — other Chromium-based web browsers like Microsoft Edge are also losing V2 support and Brave says it can only offer “limited” support once all Manifest V2 items are removed from the Chrome Web Store. Mozilla says that Firefox will continue offering both extension specifications, however, potentially giving uBlock Origin users a new browser to relocate to.

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[Null]

I switch between Librewolf and Brave. Librewolf sometimes triggers anti-bot stuff unfortunately. Brave plays nice with everything.

 

[skunt]

Remember that Mozilla is partially owned by Google

Mozilla is owned by the mozilla foundation which is a non-profit. Google paid mozilla for years to be the default search engine.
Starting to think you're retarded bro.

 

[The ATF Disliked That]

I switch between Librewolf and Brave. Librewolf sometimes triggers anti-bot stuff unfortunately. Brave plays nice with everything.

Gonna have to check Brave out. Been hopping between Firefox and Librewolf because of that anti-bot blocking. Libre will sometimes get stuck in a picture captcha loop and never pass.

 

[Null]

Mozilla is partially owned by Google

FireFox is owned by Mozilla Corporation which is owned directly by the Mozilla Foundation, a 501(c)(3). Non-profit entities do not have owners: they have board members. It is not possible to buy a non-profit. You can argue they are dependent on Google support, but in FireFox's defense they routinely have extensions available that are banned on Google Play for Chrome (AdNauseum, which I run on LibreWolf).

 

[RookTheFanatic]

Now is as good a time as ever to remind people that plugins to drop ads from YouTube (even in-video partnership ads, if you use ReVanced) exist and you should use them because ain't nobody got time for that.

 

[Anti Snigger]

Now is as good a time as ever to remind people that plugins to drop ads from YouTube (even in-video partnership ads, if you use ReVanced) exist and you should use them because ain't nobody got time for that.

SponsorBlock my beloved, I have everything on autoskip

 

[Can of Bread]

Mozilla is owned by the mozilla foundation which is a non-profit. Google paid mozilla for years to be the default search engine.

FireFox is owned by Mozilla Corporation which is owned directly by the Mozilla Foundation, a 501(c)(3). Non-profit entities do not have owners: they have board members. It is not possible to buy a non-profit. You can argue they are dependent on Google support, but in FireFox's defense they routinely have extensions available that are banned on Google Play for Chrome (AdNauseum, which I run on LibreWolf).

Alright, my bad. I had always heard Google had an overly high investment into the Mozilla Foundation due to wanting to not become a monoply in the browser space, but which also gave them a potential vector for influence over them.

 

[Egregore]

Imagine still using Chrome in the year of our lord 2025.

 

[FrogMinutes]

I remember hearing about Brave when Null was asking for the brave google play points years ago.
been using it ever since. hope you redeemed my 3 dollars boy.

 

[harbringer883]

For most ads on websites adguard dns works just fine, don't need an adblocker. Youtube ads that won't work for though.

I find that its 50/50 on youtube adds tbh

 

[666DEATHGAY]

Why are people so big on chromium based browsers? Is it actually faster than firefox or what?

 

[Queesechake]

What doesn't work with the new ublock origin lite? I only tried it on Chromium for a few minutes but it blocked youtube ads as well as every other ad fine. Unless I just happened to click 2 or 3 videos without ads which never happens.

Why are people so big on chromium based browsers? Is it actually faster than firefox or what?

Faster on my Steam Deck for sure. I use Firefox everywhere else.

 

[That Summer Feeling]

Are there any good reasons to switch to LibreWolf from Firefox?

 

[Anti Lolicon Bomb]

Alright, my bad. I had always heard Google had an overly high investment into the Mozilla Foundation due to wanting to not become a monoply in the browser space, but which also gave them a potential vector for influence over them.

I believe google are responsible for 80% of Mozilla's income in an agreement of some sort that involves firefox defaulting to google search ootb.

I think that might be coming to an end this year though hence why they are shutting down a ton of services and fluff projects.

Still, Its good to be on the fox. Suffah chrome fags.

 

[JackKillingtonWantsYou]

Alright, you got me to install Brave. Good job gang, looks like I'm off the Firefox train

 

[PointOfNoReturnPoint]

Use Brave, you faggots.

I moved to this and never looked back. Honestly except for google maps being useful its almost a 1:1 replacement and less resource intensive.

 

[Day of the Cope]

I believe google are responsible for 80% of Mozilla's income in an agreement of some sort that involves firefox defaulting to google search ootb.

Well, most of their income is funnelled into globohomo bullshit.

 

[skibidi biden]

Firefox has a trillion different forks as well like Waterfox and Floorp that are all great, I only use Brave as my only Chromium web browser otherwise the Gecko engine runs everything better

Alright, you got me to install Brave. Good job gang, looks like I'm off the Firefox train

 

[Kiislova]

As someone who's only heard bad things about Brave and how everyone who shills it is a stupid nigger who likes cryptominers living rent free in their computers, what's so good about it? I'm not being facetious, I gotta know what kiwis think of it if I'm going to get off my lazy ass and migrate browsers. Mozilla also promised privacy given the fact they're a private company that doesn't need to rely on adware like Google and we all saw how that went.

It has a very good default setup.

Just install and run, and you will have a better experience than ANY other browser on default settings. It is true that by tinkering and installing extensions other browsers may be better, but for boomer-tier "I just wanna browse" the Brave default experience is the best.

 

[Overly Serious]

I've not seen much technical discussion here. I'm not an expert in this area but I'll take a stab at doing a basic overview of the issue and impact.

I also found what seems a good mid-level article about the issue here which is probably worth a skim:

https://hide.me/en/blog/protect-your-privacy-after-google-disables-ad-blockers/

https://archive.ph/wip/inETc

So Google are changing the required specification that extensions must comply with from Manifest version 2 to version 3. Manifest being the formal description of how your extension (code) interacts with the browser and what it can do. In the new version there are a number of changes including things that Chrome will no longer support.

Before getting into those it's worth also noting that with this change, Google are giving themselves an exclusive veto over extension updates. So even if you try to work around some of the issues with continuous extension updating, Google can slow-roll that or just say 'no'.

Now one of the big removals of functionality is the ability for extensions to make web requests. These are, as I understand it, used extensively by ad blockers to check what they should block dynamically. Could an extension "hard-code" things it should block? Only with middling success. Firstly v3 also introduces a limit on the number of rules that an extension can include. According to ublock's blog, they can only offer 100 pre-installed filter lists of which a user can turn on any 50 at one time. This also seems to impact third party / shared filter lists. I don't know how prevalent they are in the community but I'm mentioning as ublock mention it.

In any case, the most critical blow is that whatever adblockers initially include, there's no way for them to dynamically keep that list updated short of seeking approval from Google for new versions of their extension. 24/7.

There are also removals of functionality that allow modification of websites you visit. I haven't looked into this deeply but I imagine this might have severe repercussions on the ability to block in-page ads and in-video ads for YouTube.

Also, for those wags in the thread saying how they love their Safari browser, Apple has joined the "W3C WebExtensions" group working towards a common platform for all extensions. Expect this to be more Google tentacles trying to embrace, extend, extinguish any rogue efforts like Ladybird (save us, Ladybird - you might be our only hope).

For me personally, ads were never the most critical aspect. It was the tracking. Already I see sites in which functionality simply will not work if you block Google's scripts. And I mean weird stuff like being able to sort a list of products alphabetically. I don't think that's always deliberate, I think it's just web-developers assuming nothing will break and not designing their code in a modular way to handle something not loading. But regardless, this is a further effort by Google to track everything.

For how to deal with this? Well one way would be to move the ad blocking to a proxy, like PiHole (n.b. I haven't used PiHole so if I talk off base here, someone else correct me). A VPN provider could also provide this. The limitation here is that whilst such an approach can block requests and tracking, it can't do more advanced things like modify a page to deal with streamed ads or traps that break a site if you block the ads. At least I imagine it can't, without installing some new local root certificate and Man-In-The-Middle'ing your browsing experience and that... yeah, anyway.

The other way and the way I see it the only complete way, would be to move beyond extensions and have full-on privacy focused browsers. Mullvad, Firefox forks... I'm not sure Google can do much about them technically but expect every dirty trick to sabotage them or make them inconvenient possible, leveraging Google's control over the ecosystem.

I welcome any thoughts from others on all this - I'm attempting to do a nice lay precis on the why's and how's of this situation

I've never understood how ads ever actually translate into $, either from TV or the internet. There have been scientific studies done on how advertising works etc. but I'm not sure how well these were verified.

Well now there's the Question That Cannot Be Asked.

I've never seen good solid evidence that what companies pay for ads is actually a worthwhile investment. But Google makes sure it's the only game in town. What are you going to do? Approach website owners directly and offer money to put your banner and a link at the top of the page? Half of the website owners out there probably wouldn't even know how to anymore. And there's no central group trying to provide this service other than Google itself. And Google say it works... And Google is an honourable man company.