AdGuard launches Manifest V3 compatible ad-blocker for Chrome

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https://www.ghacks.net/2022/08/30/adguard-launches-manifest-v3-compatible-ad-blocker-for-chrome/

AdGuard, the company best known for its content blocking solution, launched what it calls the “world’s first ad blocker built on Manifest V3”…

Google announced plans to release a new Manifest for extensions in 2018. Manifest V3 defines what extensions can and can’t do in the Chrome web browser, and any other browser that implements it. Extension developers, privacy advocates and users criticized Manifest V3 shortly thereafter. The developer of uBlock Origin, who maintains one of the most respected content blockers, said that the release of Manifest V3 could mean the end uBlock Origin for Chrome.

Some browser makers, including Mozilla, maker of Firefox, stated openly that they would not implement the limiting changes of Manifest V3. Google made some concessions, but went ahead with the launching of Manifest V3 in the company’s Chrome web browser.

Starting in January 2023, extension developers may no longer publish new Manifest V2 extensions or update existing ones. From June 2023 onward, Manifest V2 extensions won’t run in Chrome anymore…

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lmacri

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Hi Alex5723:

Thanks for the reminder about this upcoming change for Chrome (and MS Edge, per the Microsoft support article Overview and Timelines for Migrating to Manifest V3).  After reading that ghacks.net article I have a better idea why the developers of some content blockers like uBlock Origin have said they might stop releasing Chrome-compatible versions of their browser extensions. From that ghack.net article:

“AdGuard MV3 Browser takes that into account. The developers have added warnings to the extension that inform users when the rules limitation is forcing the extension to reduce the number of rules that it supports. In fact, the developers note that even the basic filter lists, which is the primary list of AdGuard, may be disabled in the worst case, as it has more than 30,000 rules. For users, it can mean that the installed content blocker does nothing at all….Most Chrome users may want to switch to another browser when Manifest V3 becomes the standard to get a reliable protection and not a chaotic one.“

I use Firefox as my default browser and hope that the developers of my content blockers (uBlock Origin, Malwarebytes Browser Guard) will continue to create Firefox-compatible versions of their add-ons if they decide it isn’t practical to develop a Manifest v3 compliant add-on for Chromium-based browsers.  The last time I checked the StatCounter site Firefox only had about an 8% market share of browsers used on desktop PCs/Macs, while Chrome and MS Edge accounted for about 77%.
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Dell Inspiron 5584 * 64-bit Win 10 Pro v21H2 build 19044.1889 * Firefox v104.0.1 * Microsoft Defender v4.18.2205.7-1.1.19500.2 * Malwarebytes Premium v4.5.14.210-1.0.1751 * Macrium Reflect Free v8.0.6867

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Alex5723, Microfix

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The number of mobile devices is 4X time that of PCs.

Chrome has 63.7% share
Safari 23.8%
Samsung 5.7%
Edge , Firefox.. close to 0%

https://backlinko.com/browser-market-share

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lmacri wrote:

I use Firefox as my default browser and hope that the developers of my content blockers (uBlock Origin, Malwarebytes Browser Guard) will continue to create Firefox-compatible versions of their add-ons if they decide it isn’t practical to develop a Manifest v3 compliant add-on for Chromium-based browsers…

According to Martin Brinkmann’s 19-May-2022 ghacks.net article Mozilla Expects to Launch Extensions Manifest V3 Support in Firefox in Late 2022:

“While Mozilla plans to introduce support for Manifest V3 in Firefox, it won’t remove support for APIs that are essential to privacy extensions. Content blockers and other privacy extensions will continue to function in Firefox as before, provided that developers continue to support them….

The decision to remove the blocking part of the WebRequest API and to replace it with the limiting declarativeNetRequest API was at the center of the controversy. Mozilla notes that the new API limits “capabilities of certain types of privacy extensions without adequate replacement”.

Mozilla will keep the WebRequest API in Firefox to make sure that privacy extensions are not limited in providing the functionality they are designed for. The organization will implement the declarativeNetRequest API for compatibility reasons according to the blog post…”

The information in that ghacks.net article was based on the 18-May-2022 Mozilla Add-ons Community Blog Manifest v3 in Firefox: Recap & Next Steps.  That Mozilla blog has lots of technical jargon  I didn’t understand but Martin Brinkmann’s article does a good job of explaining the different approaches Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox developers are taking in their approach to Manifest V3.
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Dell Inspiron 5584 * 64-bit Win 10 Pro v21H2 build 19044.1889 * Firefox v104.0.2 * Microsoft Defender v4.18.2207.7-1.1.19600.3 * Malwarebytes Premium v4.5.14.210-1.0.1751 * Macrium Reflect Free v8.0.6979

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Alex5723

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