Require permission before downloading

Please add a feature to require permission from the user before beginning a download. Search results show up that appear to be webpages but that are in fact PDFs. The browser does not ask me for permission before downloading. This presents an issue because 1) I cannot verify the download to be sure that it’s what it says it is, 2) I cannot edit the file name, and 3) some of these files are hundreds of megabytes. I use a Google Pixel, which does not have SD card availability, and therefore the “ask where to download” feature is not a stopgap.

I have encountered this issue only with PDFs because these searches are primarily for scientific and/or scholarly documents; I’m unsure if Brave would automatically download other types of files and I am not interested in finding out. I feel vulnerable to bad actors and malicious files. File management on phones is already difficult, and moreso when attempting to stop a large download before it completes. A popup does show when the file has downloaded, with the option to open it, but I do not see a download progress button. My connection is quite fast, so perhaps the files download too quickly for me to see the ‘cancel’ button (if it exists). Regardless, my connection is sometimes metered even if it is very fast, and it is not fun to inadvertently download a 700-page PDF.

Please give users of Brave on Android the ability to decide if they would like to download a file. This is available in every desktop browser, and, as phones have progressed to be the average person’s main form of engaging with the internet, it is a feature that is sorely needed in Brave’s mobile versions as well.