Stefan Mileschin

Manifest V3 is bad for privacy

In a recent blog post from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the digital rights group warns that Google Chrome's latest specification for building Chrome extensions, known as Manifest V3, "is outright harmful to privacy efforts."

EFF technologist Daly Barnett said that like FLoC and Privacy Sandbox before it, Manifest V3 is another example of the inherent conflict of interest that comes from Google controlling both the dominant web browser and one of the largest internet advertising networks.

It restricts the capabilities of web extensions -- especially those that are designed to monitor, modify, and compute alongside the conversation your browser has with the websites you visit. Under the new specifications, extensions like these -- like some privacy-protective tracker blockers -- will have greatly reduced capabilities.

Google's efforts to limit that access is concerning, especially considering that Google has trackers installed on 75% of the top one million websites.

It's doubtful Mv3 will do much for security. Firefox maintains the largest extension market that's not based on Chrome, and the company has said it will adopt Mv3 in the interest of cross-browser compatibility.

https://fudzilla.com/news/54027-avoi...rome-warns-eff