Brave Team Addresses Binance Referral Link "Controversy", Offers Elegant Opt-in Solution to Avoid Future Issues

By JP Buntinx | Fintoism - Fintech, Cryptocurrency, Finance, Block | 10 Jun 2020

Brave, the better internet browser on the market today, has recently been caught up in a lot of controversy. Actively redirecting users to referral links for Binance is a no-go, yet the team has a viable explanation as to why this was in their code in the first place.

The Brave Controversy is Resolved

Crypto Twitter had a minor fit when users claimed how the Brave browser was redirecting users to a Binance referral link. This applied to multiple domains associated with Binance, further raising a lot of questions. It was later on discovered that these referral links are in Brave's source code, prompting the team to address this situation quickly.

The affiliate codes were added into the code by the Brave developers. However, they should have only shown up as an alternative completion option in the browser's address bar.

For reasons unknown, it began to auto fill the address query without users having to click on it manually. It is a very problematic development, as having affiliate codes in the default completion for the address bar will annoy a lot of users.

Thankfully, the issue has now been resolved. In a blog post, the company explains why the default suggestions in the browser were incorrect, and how it has been addressed.

First of all, the bug affected addresses typed in the address bar, and not web pages directly. When visiting a website, users have never been exposed to any hidden redirects or other nefarious activities.

Secondly, the issue has now been addressed by disabling autocomplete suggestions to "Off" in the Brave browser itself. Users can still enable this feature if they prefer to do so, but it can only be done by actively opting in. This is a solution that should have been in place from day one, but better late than never.

Last but not least, any revenue earned from these unintentional redirects will not be issued to the Brave team. Instead, the revenue will simply not be credited to anyone, by the look of things.