ungoogled-chromium

Not to be confused with Chromium (web browser) or Google Chrome.

ungoogled-chromium is a free and open-source variant of the Chromium web browser that removes all Google-specific web services.^[4][5][6] It achieves this with a series of patches applied to the Chromium codebase during the compilation process. The result is functionally similar to regular Chromium.^[7][8]

ungoogled-chromium

Developer(s)	Eloston and other hobbyists^[1]
Initial release	December 14, 2015; 7 years ago (2015-12-14)
Stable release	108.0.5359.125-1^[2]  (15 December 2022; 31 days ago (15 December 2022))
Repository	https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium
Engine	V8, Blink
Operating system	GNU/Linux, macOS, Microsoft Windows, Android, BSD
Platform	x86_64, ARMv8, ARMv7, IA-32
License	3-clause BSD License^[3]
Website	github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium

Features

• Disabling functionality that requires Google domains, including Google Safe Browsing.^[9]
• Replacing Google web domains in the Chromium source code with non-existent web domains and blocking internal requests to those domains.^[9]
• Removing binary blobs from the Chromium source code and replacing them with custom alternatives.^[9]

The browser also adds smaller non-essential features such as flags protecting against fingerprinting and borrows features from other projects such as Debian. Some Chromium features do not work on ungoogled-chromium, a notable one being installing extensions directly from the Chrome Web Store.^[9]

History

The ungoogled-chromium project was founded by a hobbyist with the user name Eloston in 2015. It was first developed for Linux, then for other operating systems.^[10][11] Eloston used to release builds, but eventually he stopped doing so and allowed others to provide builds with his patches.^[12]

Starting in 2019, Eloston greatly reduced his involvement in the project, and other hobbyists have continued to maintain the patches.^[1] In 2022, the GitHub repository was transferred from Eloston's personal account to a new "ungoogled-software" account.^[13]

References

1. "Contributors to ungoogled-software/Ungoogled-chromium". GitHub. Retrieved 21 April 2021.
2. "108.0.5359.125-1". Retrieved 21 December 2022.
3. "ungoogled-chromium/LICENSE". Retrieved 22 April 2020.
4. Cimpanu, Catalin (16 October 2016). "UnGoogled Chromium Removes All the Googley Parts from Chromium". Softpedia. Retrieved 14 May 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
5. Tim Anderson. "When open source isn't enough: Fancy a de-Googled Chromium? How about some Microsoft-free VS Code?". www.theregister.com. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
6. Duino, Justin (30 September 2016). "'Ungoogled' is the Chrome browser you love minus the Google". 9to5Google. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
7. Github Readme Objectives, ungoogled-software, 4 October 2022, retrieved 4 October 2022
8. "Ungoogled Chromium". TechSpot. Retrieved 13 February 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
9. "GitHub Readme Feature Overview". GitHub. Retrieved 25 April 2022.
10. "Release 51.0.2704.106-2 · ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium". GitHub. First official binary for Windows. 11 August 2016. Retrieved 4 October 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
11. "Release 51.0.2704.106-3 · ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium". GitHub. First official binary for macOS. 3 September 2016. Retrieved 4 October 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
12. ungoogled-chromium-binaries, ungoogled-software, 15 September 2022, retrieved 4 October 2022
13. "GitHub discussion". This repo is now part of ungoogled-software

External links

• Official website  
• ungooled-chromium binaries