Earlier this year Google announced it would go hard on third-party ad blockers for Chrome. Google Chrome’s extensions system ‘Manifest V3’ will restrict ad blockers from working on the website, or limit their functionality. Google’s decision received major backlash but the company appears to stand its ground.
In a reply to extensions developers Google’s Simeon Vincent explained the changes that will occur with Manifest V3.
“Chrome is deprecating the blocking capabilities of the webRequest API in Manifest V3, not the entire webRequest API (though blocking will still be available to enterprise deployments). Extensions with appropriate permissions can still observe network requests using the webRequest API,” Vincent says.
Google will most likely keep its ad blocking extensions open for enterprises. For regular users, extension developers will probably have to resort to ad blockers with limited functionality, 9to5Mac reports. Google defends its decision citing user privacy. At present, Google’s Manifest V2 requires users to give full permissions to developers for extensions. With the new Manifest V3 Google wants to give users “more control over where extensions can inject themselves.”
“We are planning to modify the install flow so the user will be able to choose whether or not they want to grant the extension the ambient host permissions it requested,” Vincent adds.
Manifest V3 still has around three years to roll out for all Chrome users. As for the new changes for ad blockers it will be clear soon. The Developer Preview of Manifest V3 will roll out in Canary over the next few months.
