Google Toolbar

Google Toolbar was a web browser toolbar for Internet Explorer, developed by Google. It was first released in 2000 for Internet Explorer 5. Google Toolbar was also distributed as a Mozilla plug-in for Firefox from September 2005 to June 2011. On December 12, 2021, the software was no longer available for download, and the website now redirects to a support page. Google Toolbar resided above the browser's tab bar and provided a search box to carry out web searches. Users could log into their Gmail accounts and access their email, saved bookmarks, and web history. It had tools such as AutoLink, AutoFill, Translation, and spell checker on all browsers. The pop-up blocker and word finder were restricted to Internet Explorer. Google Toolbar was often distributed through product bundling with a primary download. Google Sidewiki was launched on September 23, 2009, allowing users to make comments, which are visible to the public, on any web page. Google uses ranking algorithms to determine comment relevancy and usefulness using criteria such as users voting up and down a comment and past contributions. Sidewiki is currently available for Internet Explorer and Firefox through Google Toolbar, the Google Chrome browser through an add-on, and for other browsers, like Safari, it was available as a bookmarklet. Web site owners could not control Sidewiki comments, and there was no way for a web site to opt out of Sidewiki; however, Sidewiki was disabled on secure sites. In September 2011, Google announced that it would discontinue Sidewiki. My Location was a geolocation service which uses the location of Wi-Fi access points to determine the toolbar user's location. This location was used to optimize search results based on where the user was located. Google Toolbar can also provide the geolocation data to third-party websites through the W3C Geolocation API. Google Toolbar was criticized when the AutoLink feature was added to the toolbar because this new feature directed users to pre-selected commercial websites.