Undetectable ad blocker?

[Dan]

Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

[Daniel]

On 11/29/19 6:18 PM, Dan wrote:
> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

I use ublock origin. If the site detects the ad bblocker, I click on the
'disable javascript' option on the ublock interface and after the
refresh the nag goes away.

I almost always get the full story after the refresh.

[rifter]

I thought the way these sites "detect" ad blockers was the result of scripts associated with ads not running. If I use noscript, I get the same warning often. Of course I also pretty consistently get these warnings even with no adblock or even any addons like noscript. Which I put down to the fact ad-related scripts tend to be bad code.

Personally I don't care about ads except when they cover the content I am there for or the content doesn't display at all because the ad scripts failed. What I do care about is the malware scripts associated with ads and shoddy scripts eating resources. Unfortunately, there's little control/oversight/correction over this on the side of website administrators, much less on ad network providers or the people who actually produce the ads. And that's sad.

On Sat, Nov 30, 2019 at 2:12 AM Daniel <m...@scifidan.com> wrote:

On 11/29/19 6:18 PM, Dan wrote:

> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

I use ublock origin. If the site detects the ad bblocker, I click on the
'disable javascript' option on the ublock interface and after the
refresh the nag goes away.

I almost always get the full story after the refresh.

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[Andy Burns]

rifter wrote:

> I thought the way these sites "detect" ad blockers was the result of
> scripts associated with ads not running.

yes, lots of sites load a 'skeleton' page with the content areas padded
out with "boo hoo! you're running an adblocker that's unfair", then have
scripts which run to replace that text with the real content (and the
adverts) so if you block the script you won't see ads, but you won't see
the content either.

[Daniel]

Well that's not my experience.

[Bill Walsh]

On 11/30/19 2:12 AM, Daniel wrote:
> On 11/29/19 6:18 PM, Dan wrote:

>> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?
>

> I use ublock origin. If the site detects the ad bblocker, I click on
> the 'disable javascript' option on the ublock interface and after the
> refresh the nag goes away.
>
> I almost always get the full story after the refresh.

I use Ghostery. If a website detects it I just leave. There's usually
nothing there that i can't live without seeing.


--
"The dog is a gentleman. I hope to go to his heaven, not man's."

Mark Twain

[Nicodemus]

Dan <no...@yahoo.com> wrote in news:mailman.205.1575080337.1568.support-
fir...@lists.mozilla.org:

> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

Take a look at Privacy Badger
I use it alongside Ghostery, usually works pretty good.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy_Badger

Privacy Badger is a free and open-source browser extension for Google
Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, and Firefox for Android created by the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Its purpose is to promote a
balanced approach to internet privacy between consumers and content
providers by blocking advertisements and tracking cookies that do not
respect the Do Not Track setting in a user's web browse...


https://www.eff.org/privacybadger

[Dan]

Thanks for all the great suggestions. I run ublock origin, adblock &
adguard, but more sites are detecting them. Although I have a decent
connection (~ 150 Mbs) my PC as a bit old & I find all the crap they
have to run ads often slows down page loads, especially when the try to
force some video on site visitors.

[Mark Lloyd]

On 11/30/19 2:12 AM, Daniel wrote:

I do that (disable JavaScript), and so far have not found a site that
complains about an adblocker, but won't allow reading without JS (videos
are often disabled, but these are sited I'd rather read).

[Cruz, Jaime]

Another trick that works well is to use the "hosts" file provided at
this site:
https://someonewhocares.org/hosts/

It gets updated regularly but you have to manually check and update if
you want to stay current.

[NFN Smith]

Dan wrote:
> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

Most detection of ad blocking is script-based. Sometimes that's a
first-party script that runs from the site you're visiting, and
sometimes, it's a script that runs from a third-party host.

I run NoScript in my regular profile, where I have it set to block
nearly everything as a default, and I generally don't see complaints
about ad blocking. However, there's a lot of sites that don't behave
properly with that level of script blocking, and depending on the site,
I have to at least selectively enable scripts. I've found that at some
sites, enabling the scripting host(s) to deliver the content I want also
enables the scripting that checks for the presence of an ad blocker.
For those sites, it's a trade-off of whether the content is important
enough to me to tolerate whines (or accept demands of disabling ad
blocking for that site), or not.

As noted elsewhere in this thread, use of uBlock Origin as your ad
blocker may be enough to block at least some of the scripting, where you
can do both script and ad blocking in the same tool, without having to
resort to using NoScript. In my experience, I really like NoScript, but
for many, it can be intrusive enough that it's disruptive. As a result,
I generally don't encourage people who don't like tinkering with
settings to be using NoScript. I haven't played a lot with uBlock, but
it does seem to be less intrusive.

Smith

[Eli the Bearded]

In mozilla.support.firefox, Dan <no...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?

I believe it is provably impossible to make an ad blocker which can
never be dectected. Currently the best that can done is for ad blockers
which understand and counter for detection methods, but there's always
the possibility that the provider improves the blocker detection.

In computer science there is a famous case called the "Halting Problem":
given any particular program can you know if it will run forever or will
eventually end ("halt").

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem

It was proven that a computer program could be written which includes a
halting problem detector emulation and upon getting the results of it's
own code chooses to act the opposite way as the detector predicts.

Ads in web pages are are a very similar case. The web page can
programmatically detect (if scripts are allowed to run) if ads have been
loaded into the page. And the web page can be designed to obfuscate or
not even load the content of a page if scripts are not allowed to run.

It's common for website owners to be lazy about how they implement
detection, which is why blockers can sometimes evade detection or why
blocking some scripts but not others can evade the blocker detection.

But an intrusive system could be developed that blocks page content
from loading until after the user has provably seen the ads, by say
quizzing the user about the ad to unlock the content. Consider that
perhaps the worst case scenario, which few site owners would be willing
to contemplate.

Elijah
------
Turing complete systems have Turing complete problems.

[Dan]

I'm looking in the ublock origin setting & I don't see "disable
javascript". Where is that setting?

[Dan]

On 12/1/2019 12:57 PM, Mark Lloyd wrote:

[WaltS48]

Click on the uBlock Origin icon
Click the "Open the dashboard" icon on the far right of the top row of
icons.
Click the Settings tab.
Disable JavaScript is the last item under the "Default behavior heading.


--
OS: Ubuntu Linux 18.04LTS - Gnome Desktop
https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/get-involved/

[Dan]

Interesting. I've always wondered why the BROWSER can't be configured to
go ahead an accept the full page with all the ads, signalling to the
site that they went through, then open ANOTHER WINDOW not directly
connected to the site, with the crap removed? Maybe could do this
seamlessly; actually only displaying the 2nd "cleared" window. Another
thing that gets me, when you open a cached web page on a Google search,
the SITE often STILL can tell you're not viewing ads. Aren't these
cached pages STORED REMOTELY from the site & therefore not contacting
the site itself, hence the term CACHED? Why would such a remotely stored
page (as I assume these are) contact the site at all? Not that I would
expect google to put the user's interests ahead of the sites, of course...

[Dan]

Thanks for the reply. I had looked there, my install lists:

Default behavior

These default behaviors can be overridden on a per-site basis
Disable cosmetic filtering
Block media elements larger than kB
Block remote fonts

I'm running uBlock Origin v1.16.14. Don't see any "update" link on the
addon itself or under FF/Extensions. Also no update listed when I go to
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ublock-origin/, just
"Remove." ??

[Dan]

OK, got it to update. Weirdly, you have to TURN OFF the extension, then
close & restart FF to get the update. I also rebooted the PC. Disable
Java is now at the bottom of defaults ;-)

[Daniel]

If you click on the ublock origin badge on the browser, it'll open up.
Look at the bottom row of icons. It's the furthest on the right.

See attached

[Daniel]

I attached a screenshot but I suppose attachments aren't allowed on
here. Oh well.

[Daniel]

On 12/1/19 12:57 PM, Mark Lloyd wrote:

> (videos are often disabled, but these are sited I'd rather read).

Exactly. More sites have auto-playing videos of unrelated stories or of
the story I'm reading and it's annoying. Or it's a commercial.


-D
Visit me at gopher://gcpp.world

[R.Wieser]

"Eli the Bearded" <*@eli.users.panix.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.235.157531774...@lists.mozilla.org...

> In mozilla.support.firefox, Dan <no...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Anyone know of a good ad blocker which is undetectable?
>
> I believe it is provably impossible to make an ad blocker which
> can never be dectected.

[snip further explanation of the impossibility of such an adblocker]

+1

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

[R.Wieser]

Dan,

> Interesting. I've always wondered why the BROWSER can't be configured to
> go ahead an accept the full page with all the ads, signalling to the site
> that they went through, then open ANOTHER WINDOW not directly connected to
> the site, with the crap removed?

So, go for a purily cosmetic removal of the ads, but leave all their
tracking, sniffing & other intrusive behaviour capablilities intact ? I'm
not so sure if I would think of that as a solution ...

Also, how do you than handle an ad which must be dismissed before the rest
of the data is loaded ?

And for funzels, imagine the ad having several different buttons, with only
one of them /not/ causing an instant billing to your google account. :-)

Regards,
Rudy Wieser