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How To Set Google SSL Search as Your Default Search Engine in Chrome OS

A simple solution to forcing all your Google Searches to be done over HTTPS on your Chrome browser.

Earlier today I was at Which Wich with my Cr-48, but using Freebird’s WiFi. I didn’t have a problem with browsing the web, because most of my stuff was through Google Services and was over SSL. Everything except Search itself.

I started poking around to see what happens if you force https on a Google Search, and it turns out you’re redirected to:

https://encrypted.google.com

Then I wondered how to make this my default search engine without the use of plugins. It turns out it’s very simple.

  1. Do a Google Search using the above URL, and you’ll notice the basic format is: https://encrypted.google.com/search?<insert-a-bunch-of-parameters>&q=<query>. We are just interested in the bolded part of that fake URL: https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=<query>
  2. In Chrome OS, click the Wrench menu, click Options, then go to Basics and find the Search section. Click on Manage search engines… button.
  3. You’ll get a window with all the Search Engines that your Chrome OS knows about. At the bottom of the “Other search engines” list, you’ll see a row for adding a new search engine.
    1. In “Add a new search engine“, put something like: Google SSL
    2. In “Keyword“, put something like: encrypted.google.com
    3. In “URL with %s in place of query“, put the URL we made from above: https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=%s
    4. Hit Enter.
  4. Hover over the newly created search engine entry, and click Make Default when the button appears over the URL column.
  5. Then try out a new search in the Omnibox and it should be SSL’d through Google’s SSL Beta search service.

That’s all there is to it. You can add more search parameters if you like via the Google Search parameter documentation. Also, you can (and should) perform the same steps on your desktop version of Chrome Browser as well. Sorry I don’t have any screenshots of it actually in action on Chrome OS – I haven’t found a decent screenshot tool that lets me capture the UI of Chrome outside of the web pages.

By [[Neo]]

I am a web programmer, system integrator, and photographer. I have been writing code since high school, when I had only a TI-83 calculator. I enjoy getting different systems to talk to each other, coming up with ways to mimic human processes using technology, and explaining how complicated things work.

Of my many blogs, this one is purely about the technology projects, ideas, and solutions that I have come across in my internet travels. It's also the place for technical updates related to my other sites that are part of The-Spot.Network.

5 replies on “How To Set Google SSL Search as Your Default Search Engine in Chrome OS”

This post is nearly a decade old, and ever since the Snowden Revelations of 2013, most large public sites have switched to using https by default for everything. This should not be a necessary step to have to take anymore, especially for Google & Chromebook.

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