I’m working on a free C# application that needs Google Translate functionality. The problem is that Google’s translation API requires authentication credentials to work properly.
I can’t include my personal API key in the software since I’m distributing it to other users. I’m wondering if there’s a way to make my program automatically grab the API credentials that Google uses when someone visits translate.google.com in their browser.
Has anyone figured out how to extract these visitor credentials programmatically? I remember seeing some apps that managed to do this in the past, but I’m not sure about the implementation details.
Any suggestions on how to approach this would be really helpful.
totally agree, it’s a bad idea to scrape those creds. better to check out the free api options or some open source stuff that doesn’t need a key. way safer for ya!
Been there, done that - not worth the headache. You’re basically talking about session hijacking, which breaks Google’s TOS and will get your app flagged or banned. I wasted weeks on this same thing years ago. Every workaround I found either broke constantly or Google patched it within months. Better options: go freemium and let users plug in their own API keys for premium features, or try LibreTranslate since you can self-host it. Some devs scrape the public translate page directly, but that’s flaky and you’ll hit rate limits fast.