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UNable to remove Google Hangouts from Extensions

Open Astr0wars opened this issue 1 year ago • 15 comments

System Details

  • OS: Ubuntu 22.04
  • Thorium Version Version 117.0.5938.157 (Official Build) stable Problem In extensions Google Hangouts is unable to be disabled or removed. This is not the case in Chrome, so reporting this as a bug.

Screenshots

Screenshot from 2023-11-24 05-18-16

Additional Notes

I looked on Chrome and the Hangouts extensions isnt installed by default. Sidenote: I'd also like to [at least have the option] to remove the Chromium PDF viewing extension, I have a program for that.

Astr0wars avatar Nov 24 '23 05:11 Astr0wars

Me too

peterlerche avatar Nov 24 '23 17:11 peterlerche

I would also like to remove Hangouts. Even better, Thorium should come without it.

ags1234 avatar Nov 25 '23 15:11 ags1234

Yeah idk why this is here along with the other unremovable exention, like it could be avuble to download but it doesn't make sence to come preinstalled and not removable.

Tre-brock avatar Dec 01 '23 02:12 Tre-brock

since there is no word of changing this. Anyone know of anywork arounds? Given the past history of stuff being snuck into this browser, this is a little unsettling knowing this hangouts app is listed as collecting browsing history. Where is it sending it? Why can't we remove this extension?

If there is no work around, I'll be switching back to Brave.

Ronkn avatar Feb 05 '24 03:02 Ronkn

So how to remove this unwanted shit with such a dangerous permissions?

mezhgano avatar Feb 07 '24 12:02 mezhgano

Idk I switched back to brave. Good luck

Ronkn avatar Feb 07 '24 17:02 Ronkn

so... any news how to remove them?

SilentWarrior1 avatar Mar 19 '24 14:03 SilentWarrior1

This is a built-in extension of the browser and is not allowed to be deleted for the time being. We are just taking some measures to display them all.

gz83 avatar Mar 19 '24 14:03 gz83

image

And it is forcefully enabled in incognito. You have some explaining to do.

Templayer avatar Mar 23 '24 21:03 Templayer

@mezhgano @Templayer @SilentWarrior1 @ags1234 Every Chromium based browser has these extensions built in. Since they are built in and not removable, they are normally hidden. I just take a patch from Ungoogled Chromium to display ALL extensions, no matter the state.

This can be seen in Ungoogled Chromium too.

Also, you can make these appear in Brave, regular Chromium, or Google Chrome, by appending the commandline switch --show-component-extension-options (The patch mentioned above simply always enables the toggle that this commandline flag normally controls).

There are three. Specifically what they do are:

"Chromium PDF Reader" - Used for embedding PDFium when viewing PDFs. Removing this would cause all PDFs to stop displaying.

"Google Hangouts" - Added when using the build arg enable_hangout_services_extension = true. This enables proper Audio/Video passthrough when using Google Hangouts. It is never activated unless you are using that site.

"Web Store" - Under the 'Chrome Apps' section. This is self explanatory and provides integration with the Web Store to treat it as a special domain that doesn't allow extensions scripts to run on it, and to allow .crx files to be installed (to install extensions from the store), rather than just downloading them like a normal file.

So, these extensions are harmless, normal, and would break functionality if they are removed.

Also, Thorium comes with uBlock Origin pre-installed, but this is a regular extension and can be removed.

Alex313031 avatar Mar 25 '24 14:03 Alex313031

"Chromium PDF Reader" - Used for embedding PDFium when viewing PDFs. Removing this would cause all PDFs to stop displaying.

"Google Hangouts" - Added when using the build arg enable_hangout_services_extension = true. This enables proper Audio/Video passthrough when using Google Hangouts. It is never activated unless you are using that site.

I'm not using the functionality of these two. Screw hangouts, and I'm using Foxit Reader to show PDFs.

Is there really no way of pragmatically disabling these, or at least to disable them in Incognito mode?

Templayer avatar Mar 25 '24 15:03 Templayer

@Templayer the PDF reader will not be disabled. It has to be disabled at the source level. Most people use the built in PDF reader, so I'm not going to disable it because that would break functionality for alot of people including me.

Why are you so concerned about hangouts? Like I said it only activates when you use the hangouts site, and even then, its not like it sends out any information. It's just used as a bridge to allow special permissions regarding microphone, etc.

Alex313031 avatar Mar 25 '24 16:03 Alex313031

Like I said it only activates when you use the hangouts site, and even then, its not like it sends out any information. It's just used as a bridge to allow special permissions regarding microphone, etc.

And if somebody finds a weakpoint and spoofs the website?

Templayer avatar Mar 25 '24 16:03 Templayer

@Templayer IDK, like I said almost every other Chromium based browser has this extension, and I haven't heard of any security vulnerabilities ever happening related to it.

Alex313031 avatar Mar 25 '24 17:03 Alex313031

Well, at the end that extension is designed to leak CPU info to any google.com website.

Cab you remove it now?

javierriveracastro avatar Jul 13 '24 05:07 javierriveracastro