ClearURLs is an add-on based on the new WebExtensions technology and is optimized for Firefox and Chrome based browsers.
This extension will automatically remove tracking elements from URLs to help protect your privacy when browsing the Internet, which is regularly updated by us and can be found here.
Many websites use tracking elements in the URL (e.g. https://example.com?utm_source=newsletter1&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sale
) to mark your online activity.
All that tracking code is not necessary for a website to be displayed or work correctly and can therefore be removed—that is exactly what ClearURLs does.
Another common example are Amazon URLs. If you search for a product on Amazon you will see a very long URL, such as:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/exampleProduct/ref=sxin_0_pb?__mk_de_DE=ÅMÅŽÕÑ&keywords=tea&pd_rd_i=exampleProduct&pd_rd_r=8d39e4cd-1e4f-43db-b6e7-72e969a84aa5&pd_rd_w=1pcKM&pd_rd_wg=hYrNl&pf_rd_p=50bbfd25-5ef7-41a2-68d6-74d854b30e30&pf_rd_r=0GMWD0YYKA7XFGX55ADP&qid=1517757263&rnid=2914120011
Indeed most of the above URL is tracking code. Once ClearURLs has cleaned the address, it will look like this:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/exampleProduct
Reasoning for needed permissions can be found under here.
Here you can download the packed files for the Firefox- and Chrome-Dev:
If you want to test whether ClearURLs works correctly on your system, you can go to this test page: https://test.clearurls.xyz/
If you have any suggestions or complaints, please create an issue.
Note: If you have any suggestions or complaints regarding the rules, please create an issue in this repo or email us rules.support (at) clearurls.xyz (this mail will automatically create a new issue in this repo).
You want to help translating ClearURLs into many languages? – Nice
You can choose between two options to contribute. You can create a merge request, or you can use the POEditor to translate ClearURLs.
Hint: The description field in the translation files are only an information for what the translation is used. It is not necessary to translate the description field; in the most cases it is empty.
If you want to create a merge request, you must open the path _locales/en/messages.json
in the ClearURLs repo
and translate the english terms into terms of your language. Once you have translated all the terms, you make a pull request of your translation.
Please push your translation into the folder _locales/{language code}/messages.json
.
Reasoning for needed permissions you can find under this wiki page.
We use some third-party scripts in our add-on. The authors and licenses are listed below.