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Ask HN: Is there a way to stop Google hijacking the URL?

9 points by anigbrowl ↗ HN
On many pages I visit now, clicking on a search result from google takes me to

https://someurl.tld/page-I-want/#:~:text=Text%20I%20never%20asked%20for

where the appended portion is the text fragment that shows up in Google's search result under the URL. It's incredibly annoying as I'm having to suddenly hand-sanitize every URL if I get it from Google. I use other search engines like DDG where possible but it's not always possible or practical.

6 comments

[ 3.8 ms ] story [ 21.2 ms ] thread
garlicGum
You could use another search engine. Though, if you really want to use google you can open the article in another tab. That should give you the correct url.
throwaway29303
I don't believe it is, your best bet right now is to change to another browser.
zzo38computer
I just use this:

  let p=document.evaluate("//a",document,null,XPathResult.UNORDERED_NODE_SNAPSHOT_TYPE,null);
  var w,x;
  for(var i=0;i<p.snapshotLength;i++) {
    w=p.snapshotItem(i);
    x=w.getAttribute("href");
    x=x.replace(/^\/url\?q=([^&]*)&.*$/,(y,z)=>unescape(z));
    w.setAttribute("href",x.replace(/[?&]?sa=[A-Z]&ved=[-A-Za-z/._0-9+]*$/,""));
  }
t21u
There are some addons for Firefox to clear the urls. My advice is to not use Google.