It's not going to be that simple. CDNs like Cloudflare are already on board with this, and Safari built a similar feature last year (and virtually no one noticed or cared). This horse has already left the barn and I'm not sure there's anything we can do at this point.
EDIT - Oh and I didn't think of this but Google absolutely CAN make websites update. "We'll improve your SEO ranking if you support this new feature". They've done this before and they'll do it again.
Except you’ll have to keep a copy of Chrome handy because this is less about what software you’re using and more about which apps are attested and approved for that website.
Once your bank says “we’re requiring this” it’s kinda over isn’t it?
The bank already has your money. Asking you to install a free app to use their services would not be seen by regulators as unreasonable. Especially when they play the security argument.
I don’t see how Chrome has to be in the majority for some sectors to start relying on these kinds of attestations. Safari already has a similar mechanism, so that right there is the majority of mobile users when you include Chrome.
I fear voting with one's wallet is not enough to prevent any business from doing something in their best interests at the expense of the consumer/user. When it comes to banks we'd have to place our hope the governments.. which relies of them actually representing voters.
I've been on Firefox for years. Was never much of a problem, but lately there's more and more sites that require a Chromium-based browser. Some of them quite crucial. A list from experience:
My bank's mortgage page
Microsoft Teams - only supports Chrome, safari and edge on MacOs.
Microsoft Office - has weird quirks on MacOs
The new Adobe Express, requires Chrome or Edge
Google Meet - after years google still only supports Chromium-based browsers if you wish to use video effects
It's not uncommon for such sites to work fine in Firefox if you just add a user agent switcher addon, so that is worth trying (can be limited to specific sites so you advertise Firefox usage for others).
See this kind of shit is why I pirate, not because I can't afford to pay $10 a month. When the $10 for a lot of content becomes $10 per month per piece of media you like, and you can't watch it on your platform of choice, and you can't watch it on a flight without paying more or not at all, this makes the $5 per month I pay for a VPN sound like a far better service.
It's true. Edge is the only browser with 4K support. They claim it's due to improved HTML5 support, but who knows really. I suspect their content delivery network uses some kind of Microsoft proprietary compression or somesuch. I know old Netflix was Silverlight-based due to their DRM.