Over the last few weeks we have been telling you that Google will remove a good number of extensions from its Chrome browser for security reasons. This can become a problem for many users if they use some of these on a regular basis.
Keep in mind that this removal will affect some of the best-known extensions in the browser’s official store. Basically, that means that the change will affect millions of users around the globe. The main one of all this is part of the company’s disapproval of the Manifest V2 extensions specification. Google’s goal with all this is for the developers of these add-ons to update their projects to Manifest V3.
They consider that the new standard is much safer for users, hence the elimination of extensions that do not meet this requirement. In addition, we must keep in mind that all of this will affect the vast majority of Chromium-based browsers. Thus, any extension that has not been updated or cannot be updated will be disabled by Google.
Based on the fact that these software elements spread like foam over the last few years, it is not good news for many. The first solution that will come to mind will be to look for similar alternatives with similar functionality, but that are compatible with Manifest V3. However, below we are going to give you an alternative solution that may be very useful to you.
And, as we will see, there is a way to continue using extensions without updating for a longer time with a simple trick.
How to continue using blocked extensions in Chrome
First of all, we will tell you that Google offers business customers the option to extend support for these elements in the Chrome browser for one year. However, end users will see the extensions disappear immediately. The good news is that we also have the possibility of using this option to expand support.
For all this we use the policy called ExtensionManifestV2Availability, which defines compatibility with classic extensions in Chrome. To do this we are going to open the Windows registry editor through the regedit command. Next we are on the following route:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SOFTWARE/Policies/Google/Chrome
Now we right click and select the option New / Dword Value (32 bits) to which we name ExtensionManifestV2Availability. We double click on it and set its value to 2.
Now all we have to do is restart the computer. It is worth mentioning that this set value tells Chrome that Manifest V2 is activated and extends support for another year. This is a change that we can undo at any time if we deem it appropriate or if we consider that the blocked extensions are no longer safe. All we have to do is access the registry again and delete the entry we just created, for example.
With everything and with this, we must take into consideration that this period will be extended over a year, so the blocking of these small software elements will occur sooner or later.
