ClearURLs is an extension, available for Chrome and Firefox, focused on privacy. When we visit a website, a series of additional elements, parameters, which generally include users’ personal information, are often added to the URL. When we visit another website, these parameters are usually shared with the destination, this being one of the most basic forms of tracking. This extension allowed us to automatically delete these parameters to protect our privacy. However, without warning, it has disappeared; Google has removed it. What happened?
Several hours ago, the extension suddenly disappeared from the Chrome Store . Google has not given explanations about its removal, and there has not been a security firm that has alleged security-related problems as has happened with other extensions.
ClearURLs is an open source extension, so its developer and contributors provide support through this platform. After a user asked what happened to the extension, its managers have given an explanation: Google has removed it for personal reasons .
ClearURLs undermines Google’s business model
We know very well that Google ‘s main source of income is advertising , users’ personal information and their tastes and interests. This extension was focused precisely on protecting privacy and eliminating all URL parameters that could reveal data about users. And for that reason it has been subject to censorship.
In an email sent by the company, Google has given a series of reasons, incongruous, for which the extension has been blocked. The first one is that the description of the plugin is too detailed and confuses users. What’s the point of it? The developer included in the description the names of all the users who collaborated in the development and translation, and that, for Google, violates its own rules.
Google criticizes that the extension includes a donation button, a function to export or import settings and a log function for debugging. And this, again, confuses users . Again, nonsense.
Lastly, the company notes that the “clipboardWrite” permission is unnecessary . Again, it does not make sense, since such permission is totally necessary, as its developer explains, to paste clean links from the clipboard. But of course, this attempts, again, against the interests of Google.
ClearURLs have clearly fallen victim to Google’s power over small developers to shield its business model.
Available for Firefox (although no longer required)
Although Google has removed the extension, it is still available in the Mozilla Addons Store so that Firefox users can use it without problems. However, with the launch of Firefox 87 yesterday, the browser does this function by itself, eliminating the parameters every time we visit a new domain and preventing them from being passed from one website to another. Even so, if we want the extension, we can download it from the store.
We hope that the extension will return to Google Chrome soon, as it is a totally necessary privacy measure for the browser. If it does not return, its developer ensures that it will continue to update and improve the extension for this browser, although we will have to install it manually by downloading the CRX from its repository . Of course, it will only work in Chrome Canary, since the stable version of the browser does not allow loading any extension that is not in the Chrome Store.
