How Ungoogled Chromium Removes Google Dependencies

Ungoogled Chromium is a privacy-focused derivative of the open-source Chromium browser that eliminates all integration with Google web services. This article provides a straightforward breakdown of the specific technical modifications the project applies to the Chromium source code, including the neutralization of background network requests, the substitution of hardcoded Google domains, the removal of pre-compiled binary blobs, and the disabling of built-in telemetry, synchronization, and tracking features.

Neutralizing Hardcoded Google Domains

Even though Chromium is open-source, its codebase contains thousands of hardcoded references to Google domains. To ensure the browser cannot accidentally connect to Google servers, the Ungoogled Chromium build process runs a script that replaces these URLs with non-existent dummy domains (most notably using the string qjz9zk). If a dormant browser feature attempts to communicate with a Google server, the DNS request immediately fails locally before ever reaching the internet.

Disabling Background Google Services

Standard Chromium relies on several Google-hosted APIs to provide quality-of-life features, all of which are completely stripped or disabled in Ungoogled Chromium:

  • Google Safe Browsing: Chromium constantly communicates with Google to download lists of malicious sites and occasionally sends URLs back to Google for verification. This entire system is removed.
  • Google Sync: The ability to sign into a Google account to synchronize bookmarks, history, passwords, and settings with Google Cloud is disabled.
  • Captive Portal Detection: Chromium checks for internet connectivity and Wi-Fi login pages by pinging gstatic.com every time the browser starts or changes networks. This background pinging is disabled.
  • Intranet Redirect Detector: Chromium generates random domain requests on startup to check if an ISP is hijacking DNS failures. Ungoogled Chromium removes this behavior to prevent unnecessary network noise.
  • Google Translate: The built-in page translation tool, which sends page content to Google servers for processing, is deactivated.

Stripping Telemetry and Tracking

Chromium includes several mechanisms that report user behavior and browser performance back to Google. Ungoogled Chromium patches the source code to eliminate these tracking vectors:

  • Metrics and Crash Reporting: Systems that log browser performance, usage statistics, and crash dumps are removed.
  • Field Trials (Finch): Google uses a system called Finch to remotely enable or disable experimental features on users' browsers for A/B testing. This remote configuration capability is stripped out.
  • RLZ Tracking: The RLZ library, which tracks when and how the browser was downloaded for promotional and marketing analytics, is removed.
  • URL Tracker and Host Detector: Scripts that specifically monitor when a user visits a Google-owned domain to alter browser behavior are deleted.

Pruning Pre-Compiled Binaries

The official Chromium source code tree contains various pre-compiled binary files (blobs) provided by Google to assist in building the browser or adding proprietary functionality. Because the source code for these binaries cannot be audited for privacy violations, the Ungoogled Chromium project deletes them entirely before compilation. The browser is built exclusively from inspectable source code and relies on standard system libraries instead.

Blocking Component Updates and Web Store Integration

Chromium features a background "Component Updater" that silently connects to Google servers to update specific browser parts—such as Digital Rights Management (DRM) modules, spellcheck dictionaries, and security certificates—independently of the main browser update cycle. Ungoogled Chromium disables this updater completely.

Additionally, direct integration with the Chrome Web Store is removed. Because the Web Store tracks extension installations and automatically phones home to check for extension updates, users must install extensions manually via .crx files or configure custom flags to fetch them independently.

Omnibox and Privacy Enhancements

Beyond stripping out Google services, the project modifies existing features to prevent data leakage:

  • Omnibox Search Suggestions: The address bar is modified so it no longer sends real-time keystrokes to a search engine to generate autocomplete suggestions.
  • Default Search Engine: Google is removed as the default search provider, and a "No Search" option is added for users who want the address bar to function strictly for URL navigation.
  • Hyperlink Auditing: The browser disables support for the <a ping> HTML attribute by default, preventing websites from tracking clicks seamlessly in the background.
  • WebRTC: Settings are adjusted to prevent WebRTC from leaking local IP addresses when using a VPN or proxy.
  • Formatting URLs: The address bar is patched to always show the full URL, including the http:// or https:// protocol and www subdomain, which standard Chromium hides by default.