Google removed uBlock Origin from Chrome

"YouTube is not hiding the skip button. On skippable ads, the button appears after 5 seconds into playback, as always. To allow users to focus on the video creative and make the player more seamless with YouTube content, we are reducing elements on the ads player. In doing so, viewers can engage more deeply with the ad through a cleaner experience."
Click to expand...

When I engage deeply with an ad, it's when I find I can't skip it, my anger begins to boil and I want to throw things.
 
www.techspot.com

Google is purging ad-blocking extension uBlock Origin from the Chrome Web Store

According to recent user reports, uBlock Origin is quickly disappearing from the Chrome Web Store. The official page for the ad-blocking extension now states that it is...
www.techspot.com www.techspot.com

According to recent user reports, uBlock Origin is quickly disappearing from the Chrome Web Store. The official page for the ad-blocking extension now states that it is unavailable because it doesn't comply with Chrome's "best practices" for add-ons. However, we can confirm that the page is still accessible from our EU Windows client.

For those who already have uBlock Origin installed, Chrome now displays a warning that the extension is becoming obsolete. Google introduced Manifest V3 in 2018, claiming it would replace Manifest V2 in the Chromium project due to its supposedly enhanced security features.
Click to expand...
 
When I tried to watch YouTube on Firefox with uBlock Origin this morning I was just getting a white screen. Switched into private mode and it got it going for some reason. I wondered if there was some Google hijinx going on.
 
winjer said:
www.techspot.com

Google is purging ad-blocking extension uBlock Origin from the Chrome Web Store

According to recent user reports, uBlock Origin is quickly disappearing from the Chrome Web Store. The official page for the ad-blocking extension now states that it is...
www.techspot.com www.techspot.com
Click to expand...
Man what a bunch of shit. The only small amount of solace I have is that there must have been a boardroom of people absolutely seething at uBlock for years and crying/pissing their pants about lost ad revenue, to cause them to go this hard on them.

I'd like to hope that Chrome specifically would see a huge loss of downloads/users, but the realist in me knows that the average person is too uninterested/savvy enough to know what's going on.

Hope the antitrust case keeps gaining steam.
 
Pejo said:
Man what a bunch of shit. The only small amount of solace I have is that there must have been a boardroom of people absolutely seething at uBlock for years and crying/pissing their pants about lost ad revenue, to cause them to go this hard on them.

I'd like to hope that Chrome specifically would see a huge loss of downloads/users, but the realist in me knows that the average person is too uninterested/savvy enough to know what's going on.

Hope the antitrust case keeps gaining steam.
Click to expand...

The more Google got agressive with their ads, the more people started to use adblockers.
If it was just an ad here or there, most people would not mind. But when there are so many ads, some of them unskippable, a lot of people were pushed to use ad blockers.
And of course, Google can't understand it's their fault for more and more people to use adblockers, so they now push even harder against it.
 


Current Chrome/Chromium versions (starting 129.0.6668.101 for some and increasingly on 131+) started disabling access to uBO through the Chrome Web Store.

The CWS access can be restored by enabling an enterprise policy. You can also try sideloading uBO instead.

This will give you access to uBO until June/July 2025 when subsequent browser updates will remove the manifest v2 framework entirely and all extensions requiring it to function will simply disappear from your Chrome/Chromium.

You might be tempted to stop updating your browser then - please DON'T DO THAT - up-to-date browsers are your strongest security protection on the web. There is no point in keeping uBO on while leaving known holes in your browser open to attacks.
Click to expand...
  • Does this mean the end of the uBO project as a whole?
Of course NOT! Firefox has stated they have no current plans for removing the mv2 framework and uBO will continue to receive the full support on that browser.
In fact, uBO works best on Firefox, so moving to it should improve your overall uBO experience.

If you really do want to stay on a chromium-engine browser, Brave plans to keep the mv2 framework for as long as feasible for just a handful of extensions - including uBO. A separate setting already exists, but for now still installs from the chrome webstore. Be careful though - disabling the setting currently offers no warning and will remove uBO (and your config).

From other officially supported chromium-engine browsers by the uBO project Edge has not updated their removal timeline yet, so it's possible it might last a little bit longer... Or not - the next 7 or so months might be enough time for them to make up their mind. Also, Opera has recently stated they plan on letting you use uBO.
Click to expand...
  • I'm not able to change browsers because my device is managed by my school/company (or I simply don't want to change browsers). What can I do?
Unfortunately, you'll have to say farewell to the full uBO project (or similar extensions). Your only choice will be installing the less powerful mv3 iteration of your favorite content blocker, e.g. uBOL (uBlock Origin Lite), which should still be enough for most users.
Click to expand...

  • TL;DR - officially uBO supported browsers
    • Firefox - uBO is most powerful in it. It will continue to work.
    • Chrome/Chromium - started removing uBO from the webstore, add a policy (or install manually) to extend support till June 2025.
    • Edge - removal timeline unspecified yet.
    • Brave - policy currently enabled by default. Will let you install uBO + a few other extensions through a special setting afterwards.
      • The setting is still in development so tread carefully - disabling it removes uBO entirely.
    • Opera - plans to let you keep uBO.
Click to expand...

For me, I'm using Brave, so it's still working for me. And it's probably still going to work.
But for other Chromium browsers, it might be time to change to something else, like Firefox or Brave.
Please don't use Opera, that one if full of Chinese malware and spyware.
 
RavageX said:
Never understood why really. I wont have it near my hardware.
Click to expand...

Yeah, at the VERY BEGINNING, sure I used it, but Chrome dropped off so quick. The RAM hogging was INSANE and then the browser in general just kept getting worse and worse, just like the result from Google Search kept getting worse and worse.

I've used Vivaldi for a short time and MS Edge, but I've been using Firefox for quite sometime due to uBlock Origin being removed.
 
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winjer said:








For me, I'm using Brave, so it's still working for me. And it's probably still going to work.
But for other Chromium browsers, it might be time to change to something else, like Firefox or Brave.
Please don't use Opera, that one if full of Chinese malware and spyware.
Click to expand...


I recommend Librewolf, it comes with uBlock out of the box and is already configured for privacy. If you rely on session tokens and webgl you will have to disable some of its anti-fingerprinting settings, however.

Edit: Librewolf is a fork of Firefox, does not use Google as the default search engine, disables Google Safebrowsing by default, and is compatible with most if not all Firefox extensions.
 
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Jinzo Prime said:
I recommend Librewolf, it comes with uBlock out of the box and is already configured for privacy. If you rely on session tokens and webgl you will have to disable some of its anti-fingerprinting settings, however.
Click to expand...

Librewolf is an excellent solution for a quick solution with all privacy settings. Highly recommended.
The only problem is that updates are a couple of days delayed, compared to Firefox. And it requires manual updates. But this is just nitpicking, compared to the advantages of a browser that is properly configured out of the box.

I also tried Firefox+Arkenfox a month ago. But it was a pain to setup and manage.
 
winjer said:
Librewolf is an excellent solution for a quick solution with all privacy settings. Highly recommended.
The only problem is that updates are a couple of days delayed, compared to Firefox. And it requires manual updates. But this is just nitpicking, compared to the advantages of a browser that is properly configured out of the box.

I also tried Firefox+Arkenfox a month ago. But it was a pain to setup and manage.
Click to expand...
If you want a semblance of automatic updates for Librewolf I recommend installing through a package manager like winget or chocolatey. When it's all set up you can have a batch file that runs the update command.

If you manage most of your software through them (which I recommend for silent updates, especially if using chocolatey) you can set yourself up a script to update all programs then shutdown the computer.
 
The Cockatrice said:
firefox GIF by Sarah Schmidt
Click to expand...


Amen, never looking back.
 
Be aware that Chrome 140 or 141, scheduled for early August, will completely remove Manifest v2

When that happens, uBlock Origin can no longer work period because Manifest v2 is gone

If you insist on staying with Chrome, you will need to use uBlock Origin Lite which is Manifest v3. For most people this will be fine, it works almost as well. For people with specific needs on certain websites or lots of custom filters, your run with Chrome has ended

Brave and Opera have stated they will continue to support Manifest v2 for as long as it's in the Chromium codebase

Unironically Microsoft Edge will also still support Manifest v2 for the indefinite future. MS probably sees an opportunity to steal market share from Google lmao

Last but not least, there's Firefox. Personally I think Firefox sucks, it's slow and bloated and buggy and Gecko still breaks too often on sites designed for Chromium which is 99.9999999999% of web sites. There's a reason why Firefox market share has asymptotically approached zero for a decade now. But uBO will work forever on Firefox so there's that I guess
 
Unknown Soldier said:
Be aware that Chrome 140 or 141, scheduled for early August, will completely remove Manifest v2

When that happens, uBlock Origin can no longer work period because Manifest v2 is gone

If you insist on staying with Chrome, you will need to use uBlock Origin Lite which is Manifest v3. For most people this will be fine, it works almost as well. For people with specific needs on certain websites or lots of custom filters, your run with Chrome has ended

Brave and Opera have stated they will continue to support Manifest v2 for as long as it's in the Chromium codebase

Unironically Microsoft Edge will also still support Manifest v2 for the indefinite future. MS probably sees an opportunity to steal market share from Google lmao

Last but not least, there's Firefox. Personally I think Firefox sucks, it's slow and bloated and buggy and Gecko still breaks too often on sites designed for Chromium which is 99.9999999999% of web sites. There's a reason why Firefox market share has asymptotically approached zero for a decade now. But uBO will work forever on Firefox so there's that I guess
Click to expand...

With 139, V2 is disabled by default, but can still be enabled with flags.
With 140, which was released a few days ago, these flags no longer work. But we can still use the method of loading unpacked extension for mv2.
With 142, the loading unpacked method mv2 will be gone as well.
 
winjer said:
With 139, V2 is disabled by default, but can still be enabled with flags.
With 140, which was released a few days ago, these flags no longer work. But we can still use the method of loading unpacked extension for mv2.
With 142, the loading unpacked method mv2 will be gone as well.
Click to expand...
Ah, good to know the exact schedule

I'm on the loading unpacked method for now, sometime in August I'll probably find myself trying out uBO Lite and see how it goes. If it doesn't work for something I use, I'll probably end up on Edge of all godforsaken things because Brave is shady as fuck and Opera is basically a dead browser walking
 
Unknown Soldier said:
Ah, good to know the exact schedule

I'm on the loading unpacked method for now, sometime in August I'll probably find myself trying out uBO Lite and see how it goes. If it doesn't work for something I use, I'll probably end up on Edge of all godforsaken things because Brave is shady as fuck and Opera is basically a dead browser walking
Click to expand...

Edge is a turd. I use Brave and disable the web3 crap. They plan to keep mv2 for as long as possible.
Also, Brave has its inbuilt adblocker, so we can load the same lists and get something similar to ublock origin.
 
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Brave is great that i can get youtube up when on the stationary bike or treadmill at the gym and watch shit without the cancer ads.
 
Gotta say, bastards are smart about it. Instead of completely disabling ublock in one move they're making it more difficult to use it, hoping that people will break. Besides if this 'lite' version for v3 doesn't work for youtube it's already significantly inferior, unless you're the kind of person who doesn't visit youtube at all.
 
Brave still works fine for me on my PC and Phone, no ads on youtube, so i can actually see the content, i stopped using Chrome a while ago, and it wasn't as bad as it is now, no chance i'm ever going back.
 
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Soodanim said:
If you want a semblance of automatic updates for Librewolf I recommend installing through a package manager like winget or chocolatey. When it's all set up you can have a batch file that runs the update command.

If you manage most of your software through them (which I recommend for silent updates, especially if using chocolatey) you can set yourself up a script to update all programs then shutdown the computer.
Click to expand...

Yep, also highly recommend this approach. It's what I do on my Mac with Homebrew.
 
GymWolf said:
Thank god to ublock origin lite, it doesn't work with yt but at least work with everything else.
Click to expand...
I thought it didn't at first, but when I turned up the slider to max protection it worked with YT. Try doing that in the settings.
 
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So I was doing all the shenanigans with loading unpacked UBO. And then learning about M2 vs M3. And researching alternate browsers.

Yeah you don't need to do any of this lmao.

Just switch to the Ublock Origin Lite extension, which is unaffected and works 99% the same as UBO. No hassle, no fuss. Watching YT just like before. In fact, I'd swear the video actually loading a half second faster than normal.
 
Made the switch to Floorp and Zen a few month ago, I only use Firefox for DRM content. I dropped Chrome almost 2 years ago, dabbled with Brave for quite a bit. I'm set with Floorp and Zen for the foreseeable future.
 
Ublock Lite works. I combine it with Sponsorblock for YT. And I also use Video Blocker to stop autoplaying videos.

The recent Chrome updates disabled various autoplay stopping kinds of extensions. But I downloaded one called Video Blocker and it still works. There's also one called Turn off the Lights which has lots of features, but I only used autoplay stopping feature in it.
 
I havent used FF in probably 20 years. I remember it it being faster than IE back in the day. But when Chrome came out it was way better. FF got really slow in comparison. Never bothered trying new versions of IE or Edge for long, although Edge was always pretty good. But never stuck with it.

Always went back to Chrome.

I dont do a lot of extensions in browsers. Just some basic ones like ad stopping, video auto play stopping, video downloader and I got a Chrome scroll bar size adjuster extension where I make it triple the width (LOL).

Is FF much faster than Chrome now?
 
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Knock on wood, but I decided to just bite the bullet and try using uBO Lite and so far it seems to work fine on the sites I visit

If this prevents my lazy ass from having to switch from Chrome then I guess I'm ok with it lol
 
Ugh, I noticed it started not working the other day and this reminded me to at least try the lite version. Getting closer to not using chrome if this continues
 
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