No, it's not that.

Brave was caught inserting their own referral code in signup forms on websites. This is basically exactly what Honey is doing and under fire for right now.

Brave basically does a man-in-the-middle attack on those websites. This goes MUCH further than just a privacy issue, it's a security issue.

I don't care about privacy, it doesn't exist, and I use Chrome. But I won't compromise my security by using a browser that is happy to pirate the pages I view.

Oh, I suppose I do see some ads. Every now and then there will be a little popup recommending something - occasionally it's something even relevant. It's funny bc those ads are from Brave but they don't use the Browser, they come thru as desktop notifications and I only see them there. I do have an ad blocker that has always been on also, so I maybe augmenting the Brave experience a little but I just don't see ads online.

I use Edge occasionally - which is far superior to Google and I don't kno how ppl deal with browsing the Internet like that, it's wildly frustrating.