June 1, 2024 at 05:34PM
Google plans to phase out Manifest V2 extensions in Chrome from June 3, 2024, impacting ad blockers. Manifest V3 aims to enhance security, privacy, and performance of Chrome extensions by limiting access to user network requests. This requires developers to adapt, affecting popular ad blockers like uBlock Origin, prompting the creation of uBO Lite. Extension developers are urged to migrate to Manifest V3.
Based on the meeting notes, here are the clear takeaways:
– Google is proceeding with its plan to phase out Manifest V2 extensions in Chrome, starting in early June 2024, which will weaken the abilities of ad blockers.
– Google’s decision to move forward with Manifest V3 was based on community progress and feedback, and they have made targeted improvements to facilitate accelerated adoption.
– Manifest V3 is designed to enhance the security, privacy, performance, and trustworthiness of Chrome extensions and introduces major technical challenges for extension developers, especially for ad blockers.
– uBlock Origin has created uBO Lite (uBOL), a permissionless Manifest V3 browser extension but comes with some drawbacks, such as less frequent ruleset updates.
– Google claims that over 85% of actively maintained Chrome extensions, including popular ad-blockers, have migrated or released versions that support Manifest V3.
– Developers with extensions still on Manifest V2 are “highly recommended” to complete the migration now.
– Enterprises using the “ExtensionManifestV2Availability” policy will be exempt until June 2025, allowing them an extra year to transition to Manifest V3 compatible add-ons.
If you need further clarification or additional information, please feel free to ask.