The French government is considering a law that would require web browsers – like Mozilla’s Firefox – to block websites chosen by the government.
The French government is considering a law that would require web browsers – like Mozilla’s Firefox – to block websites chosen by the government.
You’re right that under the hood, there’s only Firefox, Safari and Chromium, but you’re overestimating the influence of Chromium here.
For one, Chromium is controlled by Google. It’s *technically* open-source, but Google decides what’s included into it.
And secondly, Chromium already has an API for blocking webpages. All these browsers could just pre-install an extension (and hide it from users), to comply with that law.
But even if it didn’t have that API, it only takes a relatively non-invasive patch to add such blocking.
Chromium is usually said to exert a strong influence, because you can’t just patch things when it comes to web standards. You need to ship what’s being shipped in Chrome to enjoy compatibility with all the same webpages. And usually, what’s in Chromium is what’s being shipped in Chrome.