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Opera, Brave, Vivaldi to Ignore Chrome's Anti-Ad-Blocker Changes, Despite Shared Codebase
Despite sharing a common Chromium codebase, browser makers like Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi don't have plans on crippling support for ad blocker extensions in their products -- as Google is currently planning on doing within Chrome.
The three browsers makers have confirmed to ZDNet, or in public comments, of not intending to support a change to the extensions system that Google plans to add to Chromium, the open-source browser project on which Chrome, Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi are all based on.
A few hours after reading about Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi breaking with Google blocking ad-blockers, I find this story -
Firefox may introduce a paid version in order to reduce its reliance on Google revenue
Mozilla, the maker of open source browser Firefox, is by no means strapped for cash; although the said browser is offered free of charge, the foundation has a lucrative search deal with Google.
Some of the revenue also comes thanks to its controversially proprietary online bookmarking service Pocket, and some from sponsored content and donations.
But although the Google deal is sweet – Mozilla is very dependent on it and nervous about the prospect, however unlikely, of losing it. Therefore it always seems be on the lookout for new revenue streams.
Mozilla will reportedly launch a paid version of Firefox this fall
In an interview with German media outlet T3N, the company's CEO, Chris Beard, said that it's aiming to launch the new version by October, with features like a VPN and secure cloud storage.
The company's already experimented with a VPN service by partnering up with ProtonVPN and offering a $10 subscription. Now, the company's thinking of offering some amount of free VPN bandwidth to get you started, and then charge a premium for metered access in the form of a monthly subscription.
So - what is the future? Are browsers to be divided between "free" browsers, that play games with Google, and paid browsers, which thumb their noses at Google?
And, how will all of that affect those of us who routinely modify their browsers? Will we have to work harder, for the same effect - or will we just be shot down in flames? Surrender to Google, or pay to browse?
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(Score: 1) by Mer on Tuesday June 11 2019, @07:51AM (6 children)
Firefox is by default not good at all for the privacy conscious. You CAN turn off all the offending features but there's a lot of them, and most of them can only be turned off in about:config.
Some features can't be turned off at all (admittedly those are the most extreme to turn off such as js support).
And to top it off, FF has a habit of resetting user set variables in config when updating.
Nevertheless, the crackdown on adblocking shouldn't be a problem for any privacy minded user. Because the smart move is to block ads with your .hosts file https://someonewhocares.org/hosts/ [someonewhocares.org]
Former mozilla supporters should either go to palemoon for legacy support or icecat for a modern mozilla with sane defaults.
Shut up!, he explained.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 11 2019, @09:23AM (3 children)
Goto about:config, filter for javas and set javascript.enabled to false. Not at all extreme but the only rational thing to do. Then add uMatrix and you're pretty damn well off.
(Score: 2) by The Shire on Tuesday June 11 2019, @04:03PM (2 children)
That wont stop the hyperlink auditing. Mozilla has outright stated that you will not be able to disable it via about:config nor will any addon/extension be able to intercept it or turn it off. The only solution is to fork or patch the code.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 11 2019, @04:43PM (1 child)
or maybe a pre-parser ... that just removes the offending bits of "html" before sending it to the render/for-your-eyes-only engine?
like moving the proxy and the browser even closer together?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 11 2019, @06:11PM
That won't help if javashit puts it in the DOM. Patching is best.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Shire on Tuesday June 11 2019, @04:15PM (1 child)
That's sadly true of pretty much all software and operating systems these days. You have to know where the switches are and take the time to flip them. But at least right now the switches ARE there and they CAN be flipped. What I object to is they are starting to come out with invasive "features" that cannot be disabled at all. Google is doing it with this adblocker crippling change, and Mozilla is doing it with their Hyperlink Auditing.
Unfortunately options like Palemoon or Icecat are woefully out of date and under supported.
The hosts files option is a performance killer and doomed to fail - it cannot keep up with the ever shifting domains pushing ads. That sort of blocking is best done at the router anyway.
The bottom line is we're getting to the point where you need to be an IT pro to stay ahead of the privacy invasions, and I'm finding my clients just don't care anymore. I think the "privacy race" has been lost and the open internet has become a corporate walled garden. You can no longer do anything without Big Brother watching.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 11 2019, @05:13PM
These things must reflect in specific, useful features not present, or in specific, dangerous bugs not fixed.
Otherwise, your word salad is nothing but cheapest sort of FUD aimed at stupidest sort of hipsters. I doubt any of these read Soylent.