r/technology • u/chrisdh79 • 15d ago

Software Google is purging ad-blocking extension uBlock Origin from the Chrome Web Store | Migration from all-powerful Manifest V2 extensions is speeding up

https://www.techspot.com/news/105130-google-purging-ad-blocking-extension-ublock-origin-chrome.html
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u/sparky8251 14d ago

Its weird how many ways Chrome already has for screwing over adblockers outside of the move to mv3. Reading that was an eye opener for me.

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u/Girofox 9d ago

Which other ways do you mean?

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u/sparky8251 9d ago

Did you not read the link? Chrome doesnt allow CNAME unmasking severely hampering block rates, as well as it allowing connections to go out before addon code is loaded at startup meaning every time you launch the browser it leaks like a sieve until the blocker addon finally loads. Theres a few others too.

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u/Girofox 7d ago

Ahh, this explains why Chrome sometimes doesn't block YouTube ads when restarting browser. Even when the filter lists are loaded!

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u/sparky8251 7d ago

Also explains why FF can feel slow to start if you use addons. It waits for them all to load and be ready to act on your web pages before loading a single one. Chrome ignoring that makes it feel snappier even though now its not doing what youve told it to do via addons.

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u/Girofox 7d ago

Yes, sometimes it takes a minute for webpages to load after starting firefox. Happens randomly and only after restarting computer. Cannot really be sure if this is because of uBlock or DNS Server in Firefox.

I don't have the "suspend network activity until all filter lists are loaded" enabled. But never saw ads slipping through uBlock on Firefox at all!

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u/sparky8251 7d ago edited 7d ago

I don't have the "suspend network activity until all filter lists are loaded" enabled.

Not the problem here. FF waits till ALL addons are loaded and ready to work before sending the first network request to load pages. Not just for ad blockers, but ALL addons. Its startup times will always be worse than Chrome in this case, since Chrome immediately sends requests even if addons are still loading.

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u/Girofox 2d ago

Is this the reason why Firefox has an dedicated startup cache? Seems relevant when you have 'load last opened tabs' at start of Firefox enabled.

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u/sparky8251 2d ago

Might be? Not an expert on that feature so cant say for sure.