Ad blocker developers not enthused.
Recently, Google’s plans to functionally scuttle ad-blocking Chrome extensions came to light. And, as you might expect, the developers of those extensions aren’t exactly happy about it.
The proposed changes would replace the API used by the likes of uBlock and Ghostery with one designed to “diminish the effectiveness of content blocking and ad blocking extensions”. The new API would, however, leave basic functionality available to Adblock Plus, which Google has allegedly paid to whitelist its ads.
Developers have a laundry list of problems with this plan. Among other things, that it will limit competition among ad blockers, placing limits on their sophistication, and finally making it harder to protect users from unwanted tracking. Ghostery’s take on the matter:
This would basically mean that Google is destroying ad blocking and privacy protection as we know it. They pretend to do this for the sake of privacy and browser performance, however in reality, users would be left with only very limited ways to prevent third parties from intercepting their surfing behavior or to get rid of unwanted content.
Ghostery goes further than that, though. They state that the change would constitute a misuse of Google’s market dominating position. And, further, that if the plan goes through, Ghostery would file an official anti-trust complaint.
Today, browser extensions can use Chrome/Chromium’s webRequest API to block requests, which is the prerequisite to block ads and more importantly tracking scripts used to monitor users’ behavior and build personal profiles. In the proposed new model, the webRequest API will be replaced by the new declarativeNetRequest API. Essentially, this means an extension can send Chrome/chromium a list of blocking patterns and Chrome/chromium will do the blocking based on these patterns. It will, however, no longer be possible to modify or kill potentially dangerous or privacy-invading requests. The proposal would impose huge limitations on extension developers and would make it more difficult for users to protect themselves.
Google did, however, quickly respond to the growing controversy. Initially, they told reporters that their plans were subject to change. By Wednesday, however, they signaled that they would be reigning in those plans. In a statement to Gizmodo, a Google spokesperson said:
We want to make sure all fundamental use cases are still possible with these changes and are working with extension developers to make sure their extensions continue to work.
Google’s initial reason for the changes was to provide better user privacy by preventing extensions from reading network requests made on the user’s behalf.
Source: Gizmodo
About Author
