https://www.ghacks.net/2022/09/24/mozilla-reaffirms-that-firefox-will-continue-to-support-current-content-blockers/ ghacks.net * Home * Windows * Linux * Software * Firefox * Chrome * Internet * Mobile Computing * Companies * Email * Misc * Deals * [svg][ghack-logo] * Home * Windows + Windows 11 News + Windows 11 Help + Windows 10 + Windows 8 + Windows 7 + Windows tips + Windows Update * Linux + Linux Mint * Software + Antivirus + Backup + Data Recovery + Encryption + File Sharing + Microsoft Office + Security * Firefox + Firefox add-ons * Chrome + Chrome Extensions * Internet + Brave + Internet Explorer + Microsoft Edge + Opera + Pale Moon + Vivaldi + VPNs + Google Maps + Search * Mobile Computing + Google Android + Apps + iOS * Companies + Amazon + Apple + Facebook + Google + Microsoft + Twitter + Yahoo + Youtube * Email + Gmail + Outlook + Thunderbird * Misc + Crypto & Blockchain + Development + Games + Hardware + Music and Video + Network + Tutorials * Deals Search for: [ ] [Search] ADVERTISEMENT Mozilla reaffirms that Firefox will continue to support current content blockers Martin Brinkmann Sep 24, 2022 Updated * Sep 24, 2022 Firefox | 33 From next year onward, extensions for Google Chrome and most other Chromium-based browsers, will have to rely on a new extension manifest. Manifest V3 defines the boundaries in which extensions may operate. firefox 105.0.1 browserfirefox 105.0.1 browser Current Chromium extensions use Manifest V2 for the most part, even though the January 2023 deadline is looming over the heads of every extension developer. Google is using its might to push Manifest v3, and most Chromium-based browsers, including Microsoft Edge, will follow. From January 2023 on, extensions need to support Manifest v3 exclusively to be listed in the Chrome Web Store. There is an Enterprise policy to extend the blocking of Manifest v2 support in Chrome by six months, but Google announced already that it won't extend that, despite delays in getting all APIs out in the open for developers. ADVERTISEMENT By June 2023, Chrome and most Chromium-based browsers won't support Manifest v2 extensions anymore. Those installed will be disabled automatically, because they are no longer compatible. Those offered on the Chrome Web Store will vanish, unless their developers published an update to make them compatible with the new Manifest v3. Mozilla announced early on that it will support Manifest v3 as well, but that it would continue to support important APIs that Google limited in Manifest v3. Probably the most important of them all is the WebRequest API. Used by content blockers extensively to filter certain items, it has been replaced by a less powerful option in Manifest v3. While Manifest v3 does not mean the end for content blocking on Chrome, Edge and other Chromium-based browsers, it may limit abilities under certain circumstances. Users who install a single content blocker and no other extension that relies on the same relevant API may not notice much of a change, but those who like to add custom filter lists or use multiple extensions that rely on the API, may run into artificial limits set by Google. AdGuard launched a Manifest v3 compatible ad-blocker recently, and it will display warning prompts if its operation is limited in the browser. ADVERTISEMENT Mozilla reaffirmed this week that its plan has not changed. In "These weeks in Firefox: issue 124", the organization confirms that it will support the WebRequst API of Manifest v2 alongside Manifest v3. Again, a reminder that Mozilla plans to continue support for the Manifest v2 blocking WebRequest API (this API powers, for example, uBlock Origin) while simultaneously supporting Manifest v3. That is good news for users of the web browser who use content blockers such as uBlock Origin. The extension, which its developer claims operates best under Firefox, is the most popular extension for Firefox based on the number of installations and ratings. ADVERTISEMENT Now You: ADVERTISEMENT Summary Mozilla reaffirms that Firefox will continue to support current content blockersMozilla reaffirms that Firefox will continue to support current content blockers Article Name Mozilla reaffirms that Firefox will continue to support current content blockers Description Mozilla reaffirmed this week that the Firefox web browser will continue to support an essential Manifest v2 API that content blockers use currently. Author Martin Brinkmann Publisher Ghacks Technology News Logo Ghacks Technology NewsGhacks Technology News Advertisement About Martin Brinkmann Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter View all posts by Martin Brinkmann - Related content firefox 105.0.1 browserfirefox 105.0.1 browser Firefox 105.0.1 restores focus behavior on startup Mozilla introduces Firefox View tab to access recently closed tabs and pickup tabs from other devicesMozilla introduces Firefox View tab to access recently closed tabs and pickup tabs from other devices Mozilla is testing Firefox View - a feature that allows you to pickup tabs from other devices and access recently closed tabs firefox 105firefox 105 Firefox 105 is out: here is what is new firefox relay phone number protectionfirefox relay phone number protection Firefox Relay: integration in Firefox, phone number forwarding and new price firefox windows out-of-memory crashesfirefox windows out-of-memory crashes Firefox 105: number of out-of-memory crashes significantly reduced librejslibrejs GNU LibreJS for Firefox blocks non-free non-trivial JavaScript Previous Post: << Firefox 105.0.1 restores focus behavior on startup Comments 1. Cor Invictus said on September 24, 2022 at 11:27 am Reply This, again, should remind everyone how important a (real) in-browser blocker is. And what Mozilla says has no more credibility as that of an alcoholic's promise to quit drinking, come next year. People's temp... I mean browser. 1. Cor Shillingctus said on September 24, 2022 at 11:37 am Reply Do you know Brave adblock is just a glorified ManifestV2 extension? lol 1. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 7:31 pm Reply @Cor Shillingctus You have no clue, pal. Brave's adblocker natively interacts with the network stack of the browser, it doesn't call any extension APIs unlike e.g. uBlock Origin. So whatever happens to those extension APIs will not affect Brave's internal adblocker. Those are just the facts. 2. anon-e-mouse said on September 24, 2022 at 12:47 pm Reply Yeah, firefox has completely crippled its extensibility and customizability in favor of being compatible with chrome extensions once before already, so this move really doesn't mean much to me except PR. I doubt they'll remove manifest v2 support anytime soon, but the entire hubbub around it feels very manufactured. 3. xqcL said on September 24, 2022 at 1:36 pm Reply I think ad blocking should be delegated to as many 3rd party providers (Add-ons) as possible, to ensure fair competition and continued innovation. Having in-browser centralized ad blocking is bonus, but shouldn't be the norm. As they will likely (sooner or later) be prone to favor their own interests and accept big (under the table) checks to bypass certain ads (DDG was a recent good example). 4. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 3:52 pm Reply @Cor Invictus Google certainly has leverage against Mozilla, too. More than 80% of Mozilla's annual income comes from Google. A single threat of taking that away and Mozilla would immediately throw uBO overboard, lol. I don't believe they have other comparable offers on the table either, because any Google competitor essentially buying their search field would be aware that most users would switch back to Google anyway. It's also possible that Google doesn't care though, because of the mere 3% of all Internet users that use Firefox (200 million people), only a mere 3% uses uBlock Origin (6 million people), this is 0.09% of all Internet users. Brave has 60 million users or roughly below 1% of all netizens under its belt, it has been doing more damage to Google's profit than uBO for a long time, and Google does not seem to care much about Brave. Why should they care about uBO on Firefox? It's literally nothing to them. 5. Frankel said on September 24, 2022 at 4:06 pm Reply Checkmate, Chromekeks. 1. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 4:21 pm Reply @Frankel Would like to see your face when Brave is the main winner emerging from this fiasco. It's fairly's likely considering that Firefox's mobile app is godawful (see all the funny one star reviews in the Play Store) and smartphones being the primary device of most people today. But even on the desktop, why should anyone use Firefox as a result of this, when Brave feels very familiar to Chrome users and will provide powerful adblocking no matter what, without reliance on extension APIs? The meltdown of the FF fanboys like you when Brave grows as a result of this, it will be epic to say the least. I will be here for it. 2. jeffbezos said on September 24, 2022 at 5:07 pm Reply Haha, "godawful" is what Brave and every other Chrom* clone really is. 3. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 7:34 pm Reply @jeffbezos Maybe you should explain that to the 97% of people not using Firefox despite the possibility of downloading Firefox for free. Explain to them how "trash" their choice is. DELUSIONAL, is all I can say. You probably also think all those dissatisfied one star reviews are paid trolls, I definitely wouldn't put it past you. 4. Anon said on September 24, 2022 at 6:57 pm Reply @Iron Heart There is something deliciously ironic about you calling people "FF fanboys" while simultaneously posting a Brave fanboy take. I use multiple browsers personally and Brave will never be one because they are deceptive liars and it doesn't do anything special except that shady crypto nonsense. But hey you do you and when you melt down over getting taken for a ride by Brave, I'll be here to laugh. 5. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 7:43 pm Reply @Anon > There is something deliciously ironic about you calling people "FF fanboys" while simultaneously posting a Brave fanboy take. If you like Chrome (interface, speed etc.) but dislike bad adblocking your next step is more likely Brave than Firefox. It feels familiar and supports all Chrome extensions. That's not a fanboy take, that's just realism. Brave grows for a reason and I am sure the people using it also know about Firefox. > because they are deceptive liars You mean like covertly hijacking the browser with an add-on that exfiltrates the browsing history (Cliqz incident in Firefox) or covertly changing the user's chosen DNS provider to Cloudflare like FF? You mean shady like that? The criticism I have read about Brave so far was complete bullshit and easily debunked. It's also not half as "shady" as some stuff Firefox pulled, i.e. user privacy never got violated by Brave. > But hey you do you and when you melt down over getting taken for a ride by Brave, I'll be here to laugh. I doubt you will be here for it, because you will have switched to Brave too by then or just gave up and use Chrome / Edge, in which case I'll laugh right back at you. 6. Anon said on September 24, 2022 at 10:42 pm Reply @Iron Heart All browsers have their issues, not denying that. The difference between Firefox's shady stuff and Brave's is you can go into Firefox's About:Config to remove it, you can't in Brave. Either way my preference for a browser is based on research tools, which is why I mostly use Vivaldi or Edge. >user privacy never got violated by Brave. If that's the case how come people got mail from them? >I doubt you will be here for it, because you will have switched to Brave too by then or just gave up and use Chrome / Edge, in which case I'll laugh right back at you. If Brave implements useful tools that help me do my research and goes with my workflow, then yeah I might actually switch to using it full time. 7. Iron Heart said on September 25, 2022 at 12:08 am Reply @Anon > The difference between Firefox's shady stuff and Brave's is you can go into Firefox's About:Config to remove it, you can't in Brave. You can only "fix" it via about:config when you've noticed the issue in the first place. I repeat, FF Experiments can be and were in fact introduced covertly, the DNS provider was changed covertly. There was no notification or something. As I said, I did not have to "fix" that type of shit so far because Brave never did stuff even approaching that level. > If that's the case how come people got mail from them? You seem to think that Brave collected the E-Mail via in-browser telemetry, that is not the case, as even their critics admit. They don't even require your E-Mail address for sync, contrary to Firefox might I add. What did happen though is that they paid a marketing firm who holds an E-Mail database (collected from other sources, not the Brave browser) to send an E-Mail advertising Brave. I see nothing wrong with that btw. - you have to make the browser known somehow. 6. Anonymous said on September 24, 2022 at 4:32 pm Reply @Cor Invictus It makes no sense to bloat a browser with an inferior half-baked "blocker" for Joe Sixpack. The educated user should be able to choose what fits best his needs. BTW, speaking of "blockers" there is a huge difference between a simple ad-blocker add-on and a versatile content filtering add-on. As for the credibility Mozilla lost, it surely won't ever apply to Google since you can't lose something you never had. 2. Andrew Taylor said on September 24, 2022 at 11:30 am Reply It seems to me that google are trying their best to force ads and all that crap on us. If it is true that Chrome browsers wont work with ad blockers like Ublock origin then i'll move to firefox. 3. Anonymous said on September 24, 2022 at 11:53 am Reply "By June 2022, Chrome and most Chromium-based browsers won't support Manifest v2 extensions anymore." should be June 2023, shouldn't it? 4. sLaK said on September 24, 2022 at 1:00 pm Reply I don't trust either Mozilla or Chromium! How long does Mozilla confirm support for manifest v.2?! For a year, for two years, while Mozilla hopes for an influx of users to abandon other Chromium-based browsers?! And then, as it is in commercial and partner relations with google, it will voluntarily switch to manifest v.3. 5. Bob B. said on September 24, 2022 at 1:52 pm Reply Your date in the article says June, 2022. I think you meant 2023? 1. Martin Brinkmann said on September 24, 2022 at 5:35 pm Reply Yes that is correct. Thank you, I fixed it! 6. motang said on September 24, 2022 at 2:38 pm Reply How will Manifest V3 effect browsers that have content blocking built-in like Vivaldi and Brave? 1. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 3:09 pm Reply @motang Manifest V3 has no effect whatsoever on built-in adblockers like the ones in Brave and Vivaldi. Contrary to extensions, which have to take the "roundabout way" via extension APIs, built-in adblockers directly interact with the network stack of the browser. This information is conveniently missing from the article. 1. Frankel said on September 24, 2022 at 4:08 pm Reply Brave will drop v2 if maintaining it becomes too much of a hassle. They have no interest in long term support. 2. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 4:16 pm Reply > Brave will drop v2 if maintaining it becomes too much of a hassle. They have no interest in long term support. Brave's internal adblocker doesn't use Manifest V2 or Manifest V3, as it's not an extension. :D Fanboy Frankel only knows about extensions because that's what he must use since Firefox does fuck all against ads by default. Maintaining Manifest V2 would only be a courtesy towards uBlock Origin and I'm fairly confident they can do it. 3. Anon said on September 24, 2022 at 7:02 pm Reply @Iron Heart Brave's ad blocker is just Adblock Plus that they put directly into the browser. It will be affected just like Vivaldi's will be. 4. Anonymous said on September 24, 2022 at 4:18 pm Reply @ Iron Heart But Chrome doesn't have a built-in blocker, which is the main driver behind V3. 5. Iron Heart said on September 24, 2022 at 7:28 pm Reply @Anonymous > But Chrome doesn't have a built-in blocker, which is the main driver behind V3. Yes, this is true. However, Chrome and Chromium are two different things, look it up. Although the most important by market share, Chrome is just one fork of Chromium (out of many). Others include e.g. Brave, Vivaldi, and Bromite, and those do include a built-in adblocker. If you stay with Chrome, your adblocking will be gimped come January. Switch to something else, other Chromium-based browsers like the ones mentioned above could be an option. There is also Firefox. 2. Cor Invictus said on September 24, 2022 at 3:15 pm Reply "How will Manifest V3 effect browsers that have content blocking built-in like Vivaldi and Brave?" It won't affect brave in any way whatsoever. It's blocker provides the same functionality as UBO: list importing, AdBlock syntax for manual input, element picker etc. Don't know about Vivaldi's though. 7. VioletMoon said on September 24, 2022 at 4:28 pm Reply The claim needs to be placed in context [please don't delete my comment as was done on an earlier article]. "uBlock Origin . . . is the most popular extension for Firefox based on the number of installations and ratings." The latest number of users for uBlock Origin = give or take 6 million users; however, the number of Firefox browser users = give or take 220 million. That's around 3% of Firefox users. The Firefox Extensions page reports 5 million users for Adblock Plus. What to infer from the statistics? Few, not greater than 6% of Firefox users __________ someone fill in the blank, please. https://expandedramblings.com/index.php/firefox-statistics/ 8. Tom Hawack said on September 24, 2022 at 4:57 pm Reply Supporting Manifest V2 alongside Manifest V3 is something I don't quite understand : I perceive it as being allowed to block 100% content together with the restriction of being allowed to block, say, only 80%. Anyway Google has indeed decided to "use its might to push Manifest v3". What less to expect from an ad company? As long as alternatives to Google's Chrome will exist, free of Manifest V3, the toughest will be for users abandoning the former for any of the latter. As for those who have understood already what Google is, what it represents, how it behaves and have opted for a clean (er) browser, time will tell ... Not to be forgotten that system-wide blockers or a dedicated software such as Adguard will remain more than ever a worthy guard. But system-wide blocking doesn't allow to tailor content blocking as thinly as uBO does. Right now I haven't totally banned Google and Google services only because uBO allows this thin blocking. But should I have to face one day an unavoidable submission to trackers and ads, those of Google to start with that I'd likely trend to a radical approach accordingly, which would mean loosing babies with the bath water. Only say 20% of the web offering clean sites, or at least sites which run even when cleaned with blockers that i'd limit myself to those 20%. After all the Web is not life, only of its components. We could manage a far less wide hence wild Web. And we would. 1. Tachy said on September 24, 2022 at 5:06 pm Reply @Tom Correction, "We will". ;) 1. Tom Hawack said on September 24, 2022 at 5:30 pm Reply @Tachy, hi there! -- I'm not fundamentally pessimistic, even less cynical, so I guess the "if" (20% only of the web offering clean sites) managed its presence until the conclusion :). 9. Lukas said on September 25, 2022 at 12:03 am Reply Who cares? Desktop app to filter traffic is still much better than any browser extension Manifest V3 is not a real problem Leave a Reply Cancel reply [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] Comment[ ] [ ]Check the box to consent to your data being stored in line with the guidelines set out in our privacy policy We love comments and welcome thoughtful and civilized discussion. Rudeness and personal attacks will not be tolerated. Please stay on-topic. 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