Google Is Cracking Down on Ad Blockers, but Here’s How You Can Fight Back
Google has gotten a bad rap lately for being overzealous when it comes to cracking down on ad blockers. Just recently, the popular ad blocking extension uBlock Origin was noticed to be automatically disabled for some Google Chrome users. To some extent, this makes sense: Google makes money from advertising. But today, with malicious ads and data trackers pervasive across the internet, users have legitimate reasons to block them. The uBlock Origin controversy is just one aspect of a debate that’s been going on for years, and it’s not isolated: your favorite ad blocker is likely to be affected next. Here are the best ways to continue blocking ads now that Google is cracking down on ad blockers.
Why does Chrome disable ad blocking?
Google first made its intentions regarding ad blockers clear back in 2019 , when discussing how extensions would be affected by Chrome’s Manifest V3 extension platform update, which is set to go into full effect next year . There’s a lot of technical detail here, but suffice it to say that the ad blocker developers weren’t happy. Google says Manifest V3 should make Chrome extensions more secure and that it “does not prevent the development of ad blockers or prevent users from blocking ads.” However, the update disables access to the web request API, which many ad blockers, not just uBlock Origin, rely on to completely block traffic to and from malicious pages. A web request can be used for good or bad, but without it there can be permissions nightmares as stringent as having to allow users to block ads on a per-site basis, which can not only be annoying but also create more security issues.
The CEO of ad-blocking company Ghostery, Jean-Paul Schmetz, explained to PCWorld the problem with this per-site permission structure: “The goal was to improve privacy, but that didn’t really happen. Because effective extensions compatible with Manifest V3 will need to request access to all websites… users may become complied with these requests and make themselves more vulnerable to fraudulent activity.”
Ghostery Director of Engineering and Product Krzysztof Modraf agreed, saying that “extensions will lose important tools and permissions that previously allowed them to quickly respond to new threats directly from the user’s device.”
Thus, ad blockers that do not use Manifest V2 may become worse, and malicious extensions may take advantage of pop-up overload to trick users into agreeing to security vulnerabilities.
Despite this, Google continues to make changes and has begun the process of phasing out extensions that use Manifest V2 files from the Chrome Web Store – uBlock Origin won’t be the only one. Soon, developers, including those behind alternatives like Adblock Plus or AdGuard, will have to use Manifest V3 or not publish their content to Chrome at all.
How can I continue to block ads during Google’s crackdown?
Google’s new rules will likely affect all Chromium browsers, including Chrome and Microsoft Edge (Microsoft’s support page shows that Edge is losing access to the web request API). While this sounds grim, you still have several options to continue blocking ads as you always have.
Just turn your ad blocker back on
For now, there is a simple but temporary solution to getting uBlock Origin or other Manifest V2 ad blockers working again: simply enable them again.
According to Google’s Chromium blog, while the company is currently in the process of automatically disabling all Manifest V2 extensions , which your ad blocker likely is, it will temporarily allow users to manually enable them “for a short time.” This switch will go away “eventually”, but given that not everyone is even disabling their extensions yet – it seems to be happening in waves, and my uBlock Origin is working fine at the moment – you should still see it now.
If Chrome tells you that your ad blocker is disabled, follow these steps to turn it back on.
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Open Chrome window
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Click on the three vertical dots menu in the top right corner next to your profile picture.
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From the drop-down menu, hover over Extensions and click Manage Extensions.
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Find your ad blocker card and turn it back on.
Unfortunately, Google hasn’t said when this option will disappear, but for now it will allow you to continue browsing the ad-free web as usual.
Use an updated version of your favorite ad blocker
When Lifehacker reached out to Google for comment on this story, we were told that “more than 93% of actively supported extensions in the Chrome Web Store use Manifest V3, and all of the most popular content filtering extensions have Manifest V3 versions available—with user options ” AdBlock, Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin and AdGuard.” This is true, although due to differences between Manifest V3 and V2, the V3 versions of these ad blockers may not be suitable for you. This is truly an individual approach.
XDA writer Adam Conway actually received praise from Google Chrome head Parisa Tabiz for testing the differences between uBlock Origin and its Manifest V3 version, uBlock Origin Lite, where he said he “didn’t notice any real differences at all.” At the same time, the developer of uBlock Origin Lite is not sure about this.
“Only you can say,” wrote developer Raymond Hill in the FAQ . “It’s entirely possible that the sites you visit don’t require any uBO-specific filtering capabilities, in which case you won’t see a difference.” However, he noted that “in general, uBOL will be less effective when dealing with websites that use content blocking protection [technology].”
This largely depends on your habits, but if you only ever visit a few of the same sites, simply using the Manifest V3 compatible version of your favorite ad blocker may be fine for you. If Google has disabled your current ad blocker, try downloading the updated version and see if it meets your needs.
Here are the Manifest V3 versions of several popular ad blockers.
Use an alternative browser
Of course, the best way to get around Google’s rules is to not use its products. There are other browsers besides Chrome, and they don’t pursue ad blockers as much.
The most important thing to note is that not every browser other than Chrome is free from Google interference. This is because many Chrome alternatives, such as Microsoft Edge, run on the same underlying technology called Chromium. In an email to Lifehacker, Microsoft declined to comment on the issue directly, but linked me to a support page that states that ad blocker developers will face the same issues in Edge as they do in Chrome, as they will still lose access to the web request. An API that supports their extensions in their current form.
To ensure that your ad blockers work as normal, your best bet is probably Mozilla’s Firefox. Firefox does not run on Chromium, but on its own Gecko engine. And while Firefox also supports Manifest V3, it makes one key change: it allows developers to continue using the Web Request API .
“Content and ad blockers like uBlock Origin will continue to work in Firefox because we believe they are a natural expression of users’ right to control their experience and protect their privacy,” Firefox Senior Technical Manager for Add-ons Franz Josef . , said.
This means that ad blockers can continue to work as usual, without any compromises or the need to download a new version. Manifest V2’s add-ons even continue to work in the browser, and Joseph promised future support, saying that “we have no plans to stop supporting or reduce ad blocker functionality.”
According to developer uBlock Origin, the extension was already performing better in Firefox even before Chrome’s move to Manifest V3 due to the way the browser handles it at startup, and he’s now reinforced that position when he noticed Chrome has started disabling the non-Lite version. version of your extension for some users.
Ghostery CEO Jean-Paul Schmetz also agreed that the move to Firefox is a good move, saying that while the company now has a Chrome version of the extension that is compatible with Manifest V3, “using Ghostery in Firefox is the best way to get the most complete information.” anti-tracking and ad blocking capabilities.”
There are many other good reasons to switch from Chrome to Firefox, including built-in protection against data trackers, even without using extensions. It also includes a handy import tool that makes switching easy, so it’s worth a try if you’re tired of Google’s control over the browser market. Here’s a handy guide on exactly how to switch from Chrome to Firefox, and the pros and cons associated with it.
Other non-Chromium browsers include Safari and various Gecko-based Firefox alternatives. Unfortunately, since Safari doesn’t support a web request API, it’s not a great alternative to Chrome in this case, as its ad blockers suffer from the same problems as Chrome (uBlock Origin isn’t even available for Safari). However, Firefox alternatives such as LibreWolf are a strong choice since they are based on the same core technology. They also generally aim to provide even stronger privacy protections than Firefox, with LibreWolf even coming with uBlock Origin pre-installed. Here’s a list of some of our favorites .
If you don’t want to use a Gecko-based browser ( there’s been some controversy with Firefox ), there’s also the DuckDuckGo browser. DuckDuckGo doesn’t support extensions and uses Blink, which is associated with Chromium, on Windows, but tries to use open source technology to include tracking blockers in the browser as much as possible. While this doesn’t automatically eliminate all ads, it does naturally filter out many of the more harmful ones, making it a good “set it and forget it” option. DuckDuckGo Senior Product Director Peter Dolanski also told Lifehacker that DuckDuckGo plans to add support for extensions in the future.
That being said, you should be prepared to continue using your favorite ad blockers even after Chrome disables them. I wish it was as simple as just giving you a list of effective ad blockers to install if your favorite one stops working, but unfortunately Google’s rules will affect all ad blockers soon enough. That’s why it’s important to take the necessary steps early to keep them under control.