New Update uBlock Origin Extra (gorhill) - Companion to uBO

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Ink

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uBO-Extra

A companion extension to uBlock Origin, download from Chrome Web Store | uBlock Origin Extra

Purpose

To foil hostile anti-user mechanisms used to work around content blockers or even privacy settings in a browser.

For Chromium-based browsers, WebSocket connections are not available to the chrome.webRequest API. This companion extension (it's pointless to use it as a standalone) will allow uBlock Origin to become aware of WebSocket connection attempts: they can be filtered, and will be reported in the logger.

Instart Logic's technology used to disguise third-party network requests as first-party network requests, including the writing/reading of third-party cookies as first-party cookies. I consider this to be extremely hostile to users, even those not using a content blocker, as it allows third-party servers to read/write cookies even if a user chose to block 3rd-party cookies through your browser setting.

The company behind the technology understand how hostile its technology is to users, and thus tries to hide what is being done by making it difficult to investigate by detecting whether the browser's developer console is opened, and when it detects it is opened, it ceases completely to make use of the obfuscation mechanism. The developer console-detecting code works only for Chromium-based browsers however, and therefore the obfuscation technology is not used when using Firefox (a different web page is served for Firefox).

Notes

The extension has no interactive UI, just an icon in the toolbar to remind it's enabled.

Your browser should allow you to hide the icon if it annoys you. Use uBlock Origin's logger if you want to see and possibly filter WebSocket connections made visible by uBO-Extra.
 

Malakke

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How works this add-on? I've installed it but i don't see any configuration settings...
 
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Janl1992l

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How works this add-on? I've installed it but i don't see any configuration settings...
u should read the text.. there are no gui or options its listen in the text.


" This companion extension (it's pointless to use it as a standalone) will allow uBlock Origin to become aware of WebSocket connection attempts: they can be filtered, and will be reported in the logger."
 

Malakke

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u should read the text.. there are no gui or options its listen in the text.


" This companion extension (it's pointless to use it as a standalone) will allow uBlock Origin to become aware of WebSocket connection attempts: they can be filtered, and will be reported in the logger."

Thanks. RTFM!! ;)
 
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Dirk41

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Thank you for sharing :)

So in FF we don't need an extension like this ? I don't get sorry
 

Huchim

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I still don't understand why it is the purpose of this extension, it is really useful? It helps to block more... what could be? I'm using it but really don't get the difference
 
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Windows_Security

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I still don't understand why it is the purpose of this extension, it is really useful? It helps to block more... what could be? I'm using it but really don't get the difference

Some websites circumvent Adblock/uBlock/Adguard by doing some tricks behind the scene. For uBlock to counter this trick, it needs an additional capability (websocket access) in Chrome. Chrome does not offer extensions access to the websocket through a standard API (application programming interface). This extension adds this capability to uBlock. So on itself this extensions has no use and it is not necessary in Firefox.
 

Huchim

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Some websites circumvent Adblock/uBlock/Adguard by doing some tricks behind the scene. For uBlock to counter this trick, it needs an additional capability (websocket access) in Chrome. Chrome does not offer extensions access to the websocket through a standard API (application programming interface). This extension adds this capability to uBlock. So on itself this extensions has no use and it is not necessary in Firefox.
So, it can't block ads without this or with the proper rule on their settings or it helps more on performance? I have it actually and it seems not to appear in the chrome's task manager, so maybe I'll keep it but it's good to know ifthere is a page that breaks (and how to know it??) and not ublock origin
 

HarborFront

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So, how about other uBlock Orign lookalikes (e.g. adblock genesis)....do they require this? Without this will the lookalikes be inferior to uBlock Origin bearing in mind they also combined with adblock plus.

Thanks
 

XhenEd

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So, it can't block ads without this or with the proper rule on their settings or it helps more on performance? I have it actually and it seems not to appear in the chrome's task manager, so maybe I'll keep it but it's good to know ifthere is a page that breaks (and how to know it??) and not ublock origin
As far as I know, it can't block anything by itself alone. It only adds functionality to uBlock Origin, that is, uBlock Origin's logger can now see "websocket connections", which you can now block manually.
 

Deletedmessiah

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I wonder why this needed to be a seperate extension instead of adding this extension feature in main ublock origin itself. Maybe gorhill has planned to do just that in the future.
 
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Windows_Security

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When you use AdGuard extension for Chrome and click at the magnify glas icon, the monitor also reports websocket traffic, so Adguard extension for Chrome seems to have this capability also.
 
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