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Google Disables Inline Installation For Chrome Extensions (venturebeat.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Google today announced that Chrome will no longer support inline installation of extensions. New extensions lose inline installation starting today, existing extensions will lose the ability in three months, and in early December the inline install API will be removed from the browser with the release of Chrome 71. Critics have pointed out such moves make the Chrome Web Store a walled garden, while Google insists pushing users to the store ultimately protects them.
If you've ever seen a regular Chrome user's computer, you know there's at least one rogue extension that they can't explain how it was installed. More likely, several - and one of them changing the new tab page or redirecting searches away from Google.
Just gave me a reason to suggest ONLY using Chrome to most users. There is no end to the amount of sideloaded shitware extensions that fuck up your browser.
"But the website said I needed this to do X!" "I don't know. It just appeared there and I cant search anymore" "Why do I see so many ads?"
To their Credit, google has taken down a good 20 or 30 extensions I've reported as obvious garbage that violates their terms. Still. Anything to cut down on this crap is great.
In order to sideload an extension, you have to not only have OS permission (you do have your group policies setup correctly, right?) and the knowledge to enable developer mode in Chrome, but you also have to know how to download and execute the extension file itself. It's also not like the Chrome Web store is any safer. There are tons of malware and spyware extensions there.
This is just another idiotic way that a corporation can scream out "look at me, look at me, we're protecting users", when in fact the exact opposite is true. They aren't protecting users, they are harming users by taking control and choice away from users.