rinukkusu / paywallr

🔓 Web extension for reading articles locked behind paywalls of over 50 german newspapers, e.g. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Leipziger Volkszeitung & Hamburger Abendblatt

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paywall + r (emove)
read articles locked behind
paywalls of over 50 newspapers.

Tear down this wall paywall!

This extension is provided for educational purposes only. I do not endorse the use of it and strongly encourage you to subscribe to your favourite newspaper and support local journalism.

Got something on your heart? Throw me a mail @ [e-mail] :)

Removed from Chrome Web Store as of 2020-07-02

Supported sites

• Allgemeine Zeitung
• Bergedorfer Zeitung v2.0+
• Berliner Morgenpost
• Braunschweiger Zeitung v2.6+
• Burgstädter Zeitung
• Cellesche Zeitung Text only
• Dorstener Zeitung v2.0+
• Dresdner Neuste Nachrichten Text only
• Echo Online
• Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Text only, pictures available in gallery - v2.0+
• Giessener Anzeiger
• Gifhorner Rundschau v2.6+
• Göttinger Tageblatt Text only
• Halterner Zeitung v2.0+
• Hamburger Abendblatt
• Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung Text only
• Harzkurier v2.6+
• Hellweger Anzeiger v2.0+
• Helmstedter Nachrichten v2.6+
• Hochheimer Zeitung
• Hofheimer Zeitung
• Iserlohner Kreisanzeiger und Zeitung
• Kieler Nachrichten Text only
• Kreis-Anzeiger
• Kölner Stadtanzeiger
• Kölnische Rundschau
• Lampertheimer Zeitung
• Lauterbacher Anzeiger
• Leipziger Volkszeitung Text only
• Lübecker Nachrichten Text only
• Main-Spitze
• Mitteldeutsche Zeitung
• Mittelhessen.de
• Märkische Allgemeine Text only
• Münsterlandzeitung v2.0+
• NahverkehrHAMBURG v1.1+
• Neue Presse Text only
• Neue Rottweiler Zeitung v2.0+
• Neue Ruhr Zeitung (NRZ)
• Oberhessische Zeitung
• Ostsee-Zeitung Text only
• Ostthüringer Zeitung
• Peiner Allgemeine Text only
• Peiner Nachrichten v2.6+
• Ruhrnachrichten v2.0+
• Saarbrücker Zeitung
• Salzgitter Zeitung v2.6+
• Schaumburger Nachrichten Text only
• Sächsische Zeitung v2.4+
• Thüringer Allgemeine
• Titanic Magazin v2.2+
• Usinger Anzeiger
• Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
• Westfalenpost
• Wiesbadener Kurier
• Wolfenbütteler Zeitung v2.6+
• Wolfsburger Allgemeine/Aller-Zeitung Text only
• Wolfsburger Nachrichten v2.6+
• Wormser Zeitung
• ze.tt v2.0+

Disabling sites

As of v2.0, you can disable paywallr for a site by clicking on the browser action icon (usually in the upper right) on a supported site. This is useful when you have an account or the unlock doesn't work.

Unlock mechanisms

Madsack (e.g. Leipziger Volkszeitung, Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung, Kieler Nachrichten)

Madsack stores the complete article in text form (i.e. without media and formatting) in the source code of the page to enable indexing of paywalled articles in search engines like Google & Co. They also indicate that their article is available for free, presumably to achieve a higher ranking. The Web extension just reads this text and replaces the preview with it.

FUNKE Mediengruppe & BZV Medienhaus (e.g. Hamburger Abendblatt, Berliner Morgenpost, Thüringer Allgemeine, Westfalenpost)

The CMS of the FUNKE Mediengruppe/BZV Medienhaus uses a solution by Piano, where the content gets removed afterwards. This script is easily blocked and requires no further work.

Introduced in Version 2.0. Some articles of all FUNKE newspapers & BZV Medienhaus will be "encrypted" with a Caesar chiffre. This is easily decrypted with no further work required.

VRM (e.g. Mittelhessen, Echo Online, Allgemeine Zeitung)

The CMS of the Verlagsgruppe Rhein-Main encrypts the article afterwards. They use a solution of the company LaterPay, whose encryption can be prevented by removing the configuration key used by LaterPay.

DuMont Newsnet (e.g. Kölner Stadtanzeiger & Mitteldeutsche Zeitung)

DuMont hides the article with CSS rules and displays a paywall container over it.

Saarbrücker Zeitung

The Saarbrücker Zeitung saves the complete article and replaces it afterwards. Their paywall script is pretty bad and blocked by all common adblockers.

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ.NET/F+)

Never introduced. The FAZ has a social media section here, which is linked in their Instagram biography and shall be used to find articles they post about. Articles in this category can be unlocked by adding a ?premium at the end.

Fixed as of 03/16/2020

Introduced in Version 2.0. Article text will be loaded from meta data (JSON-LD) only available on the mobile page using a XMLHttpRequest with a spoofed user-agent.

NahverkehrHAMBURG / NRWZ / Titanic Magazin

Introduced in Version 1.1/2.0/2.2. These sites use Steady to earn money. Only the view is blocked by an element paywallr simply removes.

Lensing Media (e.g. Ruhrnachrichten)

Introduced in Version 2.0. The CMS of Lensing Media uses a solution by Piano, where the content gets removed afterwards. Blocking this script works fine. Additionally, the content is blurred, but this blur is easily removeable by removing the class of the article object.

Bergedorfer Zeitung

Introduced in Version 2.0. The Bergedorfer Zeitung uses a solution by Laterpay, which decrypts the text after paying. They use a Caesar chiffre which is easily decrypted.

ze.tt (Youth magazine of ZEIT)

Introduced in Version 2.0. ze.tt uses a max-height inline style on the article container to hide the content. This is removeable by overwriting the style with !important.

License

paywallr is licensed under the MIT License.