Google officially released version 80 of Chrome browser this week for computer and smartphone systems. It is the stable version for 2020 after a series of experimental versions that introduced many new features for the most widely used browser by users at the moment. Along with performance improvements and security patches, the new version comes with several new features in terms of privacy and browsing. In this article, we will detail the most important features and how to benefit from them.
Initially, you can get the latest version by going to the main menu, then “Help,” and by clicking on “About Google Chrome,” it will automatically update to version 80, the latest one. If the browser is not currently installed on your computer, you can download it directly from this link.
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One of the most annoying things on the internet nowadays is notification messages that websites want to send to users for marketing and data tracking purposes. Now, with version 80, the browser will block or automatically mute those notifications if the user blocks the notification request from the same site multiple times to prevent annoyance. When receiving these notifications again, the browser will show a new icon next to the address bar indicating that it has blocked some notifications from the current site. It will be up to the user to decide whether to view that notification by clicking on the icon or ignoring the notification completely.
This feature is not activated by default and must first be enabled through the flags menu via the following link:
chrome://flags/#quiet-notification-prompts
You can either enable it by selecting “Enabled” or enable the option to automatically block notifications from the browser in case of repeatedly rejecting notification requests by selecting “Enabled with adaptive activation.”
Then, go to the main menu, select “Settings,” then “Advanced,” go to “Privacy and security,” click on “Site Settings,” then “Notifications,” and activate the “Use quieter messaging” option to activate the feature and get rid of those annoying notifications forever.
Blocking Ads that Consume Computer Resources
Ads have become one of the annoying elements that force everyone to install ad-blocking extensions. The new feature in this version allows blocking some ads that burden computer resources, such as videos, flash, or specific scripts that can significantly consume computer resources like the processor and RAM. Also, this feature is not enabled by default and can be activated through the flags menu via the following link:
chrome://flags/#enable-heavy-ad-intervention
Greater Control Over Cookies
It is known that cookies facilitate the connection between websites and the user’s device or browser, but they also cause many problems and are the primary source of data tracking and privacy breaches. In this version of Chrome, Google introduced “Same-Site Cookies,” which means that cookies will only be used by the site that created the file on your computer, and control will be based on the domain name. This increases privacy and greatly reduces the possibility of selling and marketing user data. To activate this feature, simply enable it through the flags menu via the following link:
chrome://flags/#same-site-by-default-cookies
To illustrate further, when visiting a site like “example.com,” a cookie file is created on your computer with the name “example.com” containing data such as your account information on the site, your browsing duration in the last visit, and other data that facilitate your connection to the site and distinguish you from other users. Starting from this version, any other site or party that does not have a link containing “example.com” in the domain will not be able to access that file and use it from your computer, increasing your privacy more than before.
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Continued Automatic Upgrade to HTTPS
As mentioned earlier, all browsers are currently moving towards supporting the secure “HTTPS” protocol through a long-term program in multiple stages to avoid suddenly blocking sites that still operate on the “HTTP” protocol. This process continued in version 80 of Chrome, where some sites are now operating through the “HTTPS” protocol but still contain some content that does not support that protocol, known as mixed content. In this stage, a new feature has been added so that if any element on the site is classified as an element that does not support the “HTTPS” protocol, the browser will attempt to automatically upgrade that element to support “HTTPS.” If the attempt fails, the element will be classified as insecure content, with the option to allow or disallow loading by the user to ensure smooth browsing without issues. It is expected that any content like images, audio and video clips, or code that does not fully support the “HTTPS” protocol will be blocked starting from the upcoming version of Chrome, numbered 81.
