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Ad blocking or ad filtering is a
software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...
capability for blocking or altering
online advertising Online advertising, also known as online marketing, Internet advertising, digital advertising or web advertising, is a form of marketing and advertising which uses the Internet to promote products and services to audiences and platform users. ...
in a
web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...
, an
application Application may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Application software, computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks ** Application layer, an abstraction layer that specifies protocols and interface methods used in a c ...
or a network. This may be done using
browser extension A browser extension is a small software module for customizing a web browser. Browsers typically allow a variety of extensions, including user interface modifications, cookie management, ad blocking, and the custom scripting and styling of web p ...
s or other methods.


Technologies and native countermeasures

Online advertising exists in a variety of forms, including
web banner A web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web delivered by an ad server. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking ...
s,
pictures An image is a visual representation of something. It can be two-dimensional, three-dimensional, or somehow otherwise feed into the visual system to convey information. An image can be an artifact, such as a photograph or other two-dimensiona ...
, animations, embedded audio and video, text, or pop-up windows, and can even employ audio and video
autoplay AutoPlay, a feature introduced in Windows 98, examines newly discovered removable media and devices and, based on content such as pictures, music or video files, launches an appropriate application to play or display the content. It is closely rel ...
. Many browsers offer some ways to remove or alter advertisements: either by targeting technologies that are used to deliver ads (such as embedded content delivered through
browser plug-in A browser extension is a small software module for customizing a web browser. Browsers typically allow a variety of extensions, including user interface modifications, cookie management, ad blocking, and the custom scripting and styling of web p ...
s or via
HTML5 HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HTML ...
), targeting
URL A Uniform Resource Locator (URL), colloquially termed as a web address, is a reference to a web resource that specifies its location on a computer network and a mechanism for retrieving it. A URL is a specific type of Uniform Resource Identifie ...
s that are the source of ads, or targeting behaviors characteristic to ads (such as the use of HTML5 AutoPlay of both audio and video).


Prevalence

Use of mobile and desktop ad blocking software designed to remove traditional advertising grew by 41% worldwide and by 48% in the U.S. between Q2 2014 and Q2 2015. As of Q2 2015, 45 million Americans were using ad blockers. In a survey research study released Q2 2016, Met Facts reported 72 million Americans, 12.8 million adults in the UK, and 13.2 million adults in France were using ad blockers on their PCs, smartphones, or tablet computers. In March 2016, the
Internet Advertising Bureau The Internet Advertising Bureau UK (IAB UK) is the industry body for digital advertising in the United Kingdom, founded in 1997. It promotes a sustainable future for digital advertising and best practice for advertisers, agencies, and media owne ...
reported that UK ad blocking was already at 22% among people over 18 years old. As of 2021, 27% of US Internet users used ad blocking software, with continued increasing trend since 2014. Among technical audiences the rate of blocking reaches 58% as of 2021.


Reasons for blocking ads

There are various fundamental reasons why one would want to use ad-blocking: * Protecting
privacy Privacy (, ) is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves, and thereby express themselves selectively. The domain of privacy partially overlaps with security, which can include the concepts of a ...
**Reduces the number of
HTTP cookie HTTP cookies (also called web cookies, Internet cookies, browser cookies, or simply cookies) are small blocks of data created by a web server while a user is browsing a website and placed on the user's computer or other device by the user's w ...
s,
browser fingerprinting A device fingerprint or machine fingerprint is information collected about the software and hardware of a remote computing device for the purpose of identification. The information is usually assimilated into a brief identifier using a fingerprinti ...
and other aggressive behavioral tracking techniques * Protecting from
malvertising Malvertising (a portmanteau of "malicious software (malware) advertising") is the use of online advertising to spread malware. It typically involves injecting malicious or malware-laden advertisements into legitimate online advertising networks ...
**Any intrusive actions from the ads, including but not limited to:
drive-by downloads Drive-by download is of two types, each concerning the unintended download of computer software from the Internet: # Authorized drive-by downloads are downloads which a person has authorized but without understanding the consequences (e.g. down ...
, invisible overlay click areas (such as a regular link that opens an unexpected external website), opening in a new tab, popups and auto-redirects. * Saving bandwidth (and by extension, money) **On most websites user tracking and advertising code alone constitutes the majority of the downloadable content, thus significantly inflating the amount of data downloaded by the user ("web bloat") * Better user experience ** Some ads cover the text making it partly illegible, making the site unusable ** Less cluttered pages ** Faster page loading times ** Fewer distractions * Accessibility reasons ** The motion in some ads is nauseating for some users * Save battery on
mobile device A mobile device (or handheld computer) is a computer small enough to hold and operate in the hand. Mobile devices typically have a flat LCD or OLED screen, a touchscreen interface, and digital or physical buttons. They may also have a physical ...
s or
laptop A laptop, laptop computer, or notebook computer is a small, portable personal computer (PC) with a screen and alphanumeric keyboard. Laptops typically have a clam shell form factor with the screen mounted on the inside of the upper li ...
s * Prevent undesirable websites from making ad revenue out of the user's visit Publishers and their representative trade bodies, on the other hand, argue that web ads provide revenue to website owners, which enable the website owners to create or otherwise purchase content for the website. Publishers state that the prevalent use of ad blocking software and devices could adversely affect website owner revenue and thus, in turn, lower the availability of free content on websites.


Benefits

For users, the benefits of ad blocking software include quicker loading and cleaner looking web pages with fewer
distraction Distraction is the process of diverting the attention of an individual or group from a desired area of focus and thereby blocking or diminishing the reception of desired information. Distraction is caused by: the lack of ability to pay attention ...
s, lower resource waste (bandwidth, CPU, memory, etc.), and privacy benefits gained through the exclusion of the
tracking Tracking may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Tracking, in computer graphics, in match moving (insertion of graphics into footage) * Tracking, composing music with music tracker software * Eye tracking, measuring the position of t ...
and profiling systems of ad delivery platforms. Blocking ads can also save substantial amounts of electrical energy and lower users' power bills, and additional energy savings can also be expected at the grid level because fewer data packets need to be transmitted between the user's machine and the website server.


User experience

Ad blocking software may have other benefits to users'
quality of life Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards ...
, as it decreases Internet users' exposure to advertising and marketing industries, which promote the purchase of numerous consumer products and services that are potentially harmful or unhealthy and on creating the urge to buy immediately. The average person sees more than 5000 advertisements daily, many of which are from online sources. Ads may promise viewers that their lives will be improved by purchasing the item that is being promoted (e.g.,
fast food Fast food is a type of mass-produced food designed for commercial resale, with a strong priority placed on speed of service. It is a commercial term, limited to food sold in a restaurant or store with frozen, preheated or precooked ingredien ...
,
soft drink A soft drink (see § Terminology for other names) is a drink that usually contains water (often carbonated), a sweetener, and a natural and/or artificial flavoring. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a su ...
s,
candy Candy, also called sweets (British English) or lollies (Australian English Australian English (AusE, AusEng, AuE, AuEng, en-AU) is the set of varieties of the English language native to Australia. It is the country's common language an ...
, expensive
consumer electronics Consumer electronics or home electronics are electronic (analog or digital) equipment intended for everyday use, typically in private homes. Consumer electronics include devices used for entertainment, communications and recreation. Usually r ...
) or encourages users to get into debt or
gamble Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three elem ...
. Additionally, if Internet users buy all of these items, the packaging and the containers (in the case of candy and soda pop) end up being disposed of, leading to negative environmental impacts of waste disposal. Advertisements are very carefully crafted to target weaknesses in human psychology; as such, a reduction in exposure to advertisements could be beneficial for users' quality of life. Unwanted advertising can also harm the advertisers themselves if users become annoyed by the ads. Irritated users might make a conscious effort to avoid the goods and services of firms which are using annoying "pop-up" ads which block the Web content the user is trying to view. For users not interested in making purchases, the blocking of ads can also save time. Any ad that appears on a website exerts a toll on the user's "attention budget" since each ad enters the user's field of view and must either be consciously ignored or closed, or dealt with in some other way. A user who is strongly focused on reading solely the content that they are seeking likely has no desire to be diverted by advertisements that seek to sell unneeded or unwanted goods and services. In contrast, users who are actively seeking items to purchase, might appreciate advertising, in particular targeted ads.


Security

Another important aspect is improving security; online advertising subjects users to a higher risk of infecting their devices with
computer virus A computer virus is a type of computer program that, when executed, replicates itself by modifying other computer programs and inserting its own code. If this replication succeeds, the affected areas are then said to be "infected" with a compu ...
es than surfing pornography websites. In a high-profile case, malware was distributed through advertisements provided to YouTube by a malicious customer of Google's Doubleclick. In August 2015, a
0-day exploit A zero-day (also known as a 0-day) is a computer-software vulnerability previously unknown to those who should be interested in its mitigation, like the vendor of the target software. Until the vulnerability is mitigated, hackers can exploit it t ...
in the Firefox browser was discovered in an advertisement on a website. When Forbes required users to disable ad blocking before viewing their website, those users were immediately served with pop-under malware. The
Australian Signals Directorate Australian Signals Directorate (ASD), formerly the Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) is the federal statutory agency in the Australian Government responsible for foreign signals intelligence, support to military operations, cyber warfare, and ...
recommends individuals and organizations block advertisements to improve their information security posture and mitigate potential
malvertising Malvertising (a portmanteau of "malicious software (malware) advertising") is the use of online advertising to spread malware. It typically involves injecting malicious or malware-laden advertisements into legitimate online advertising networks ...
attacks and machine compromise. The information security firm
Webroot Webroot Inc. is an American privately-held cybersecurity software company that provides Internet security for consumers and businesses. The company was founded in Boulder, Colorado, US, and is now headquartered in Broomfield, Colorado, and h ...
also notes employing ad blockers provide effective countermeasures against malversating campaigns for less technically sophisticated computer users.


Monetary

Ad blocking reduces page load time and saves bandwidth for the users. Users who pay for total transferred bandwidth ("capped" or pay-for-usage connections) including most mobile users worldwide have a direct financial benefit from filtering an ad before it is loaded. Using an ad blocker is a common method of improving internet speeds. Analysis of the 200 most popular news sites (as ranked by Alexa) in 2015 showed that
Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements current and a ...
Tracking Protection lead to 39% reduction in data usage and 44% median reduction in page load time. According to research performed by '' The New York Times'', ad blockers reduced data consumption and sped upload time by more than half on 50 news sites, including ''The New York Times'' itself. Journalists concluded that "visiting the home page of Boston.com (the site with most ad data in the study) every day for a month would cost the equivalent of about $9.50 in data usage just for the ads". It is a known problem with most web browsers, including Firefox, that restoring sessions often plays multiple embedded ads at once. However, this annoyance can easily be averted simply by setting the web browser to clear all cookies and browsing-history information each time the browser software is closed. Another preventive option is to use a script blocker, which enables the user to disable all scripts and then to selectively re-enable certain scripts as desired, in order to determine the role of each script. The user thus can very quickly learn which scripts are truly necessary (from the standpoint of webpage functionality) and consequently which sources of scripts are undesirable, and this insight is helpful in visiting other websites in general. Thus by precisely controlling which scripts are run in each webpage viewed, the user retains full control over what happens on their computer CPU and computer screen.


Methods

One method of filtering is simply to block (or prevent auto play of)
Flash animation Adobe Flash animation or Adobe Flash cartoon (formerly Macromedia Flash animation, Macromedia Flash cartoon, FutureSplash animation, and FutureSplash cartoon) is an animation that is created with the Adobe Animate (formerly Flash Professional) p ...
or image loading or
Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
audio and video files. This can be done in most browsers easily and also improves security and privacy. This crude technological method is refined by numerous
browser extension A browser extension is a small software module for customizing a web browser. Browsers typically allow a variety of extensions, including user interface modifications, cookie management, ad blocking, and the custom scripting and styling of web p ...
s. Every web browser handles this task differently, but, in general, one alters the options, preferences or application extensions to filter specific media types. An additional add-on is usually required to differentiate between ads and non-ads using the same technology, or between wanted and unwanted ads or behaviors. The more advanced ad-blocking filter software allows fine-grained control of advertisements through features such as blacklists, whitelists, and regular expression filters. Certain security features also have the effect of disabling some ads. Some antivirus software can act as an ad blocker. Filtering by intermediaries such as ISP providers or national governments is increasingly common.


Browser integration

As of 2015, many web browsers block unsolicited pop-up ads automatically. Current versions of Konqueror, Microsoft Edge, and Firefox also include content filtering support out-of-the-box. Content filtering can be added to Firefox, Chromium-based browsers, Opera,
Safari A safari (; ) is an overland journey to observe wild animals, especially in eastern or southern Africa. The so-called "Big Five" game animals of Africa – lion, leopard, rhinoceros, elephant, and Cape buffalo – particularly form an importa ...
, and other browsers with extensions such as AdBlock, Adblock Plus, and uBlock Origin, and a number of sources provide regularly updated filter lists. Adblock Plus is included in the freeware browser
Maxthon Maxthon (, formerly named ''MyIE2'') is a freeware web browser, created by JeffChen in Singapore. It is available for Windows, macOS, Linux, and as ''Maxthon Mobile'' for Android, iOS, and Windows Phone 8. Since version 6 Maxthon is based on Chr ...
from the People's Republic of China by default. Another method for filtering advertisements uses
Cascading Style Sheets Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a style sheet language used for describing the presentation of a document written in a markup language such as HTML or XML (including XML dialects such as SVG, MathML or XHTML). CSS is a cornerstone techno ...
(CSS) rules to hide specific HTML and XHTML
elements Element or elements may refer to: Science * Chemical element, a pure substance of one type of atom * Heating element, a device that generates heat by electrical resistance * Orbital elements, parameters required to identify a specific orbit of ...
. This was once handled directly by a browser's user style sheet and custom CSS files. The CSS files employed regular expressions to describe a general advertisement profile. An example CSS selector from the once popular Floppy Moose (2003) style sheet is below. It simply hides anything with a link containing the characters "ad." A:link REF*="ad." IMG Stylesheets are still used to block ads today. However they are almost always used by an ad-blocking extension that combines CSS with other techniques. AdBlock Plus syntax includes CSS selectors which they call "element hiding" rules. The newer uBlock origin even allows "cosmetic filters" which inject custom CSS declarations. Due to changes in advertising techniques, modern ad-blockers use more specific selectors, more frequently updated selectors, and a greater quantity of selectors. For example, the Floppy Moose style sheet originally contained 40 lines of CSS. In 2022, Easylist contains thousands of CSS selectors. In contrast to the general example above, below is one of the many specific CSS selectors from Easylist (2022). a ref^="https://topoffers.com/"href*="/?pid="] In January 2016, Brave (web browser), Brave, a free, ad-blocking browser for Mac, PC, Android, and iOS devices was launched. Brave users can optionally enable Brave's own ad network to earn
Basic Attention Token Brave is a free and open-source web browser developed by Brave Software, Inc. based on the Chromium web browser. Brave is a privacy-focused browser, which automatically blocks online advertisements and website trackers in its default settings. ...
s (BATs), a type of cryptocurrency, which can be sent as micro-payments to publishers. At the beginning of 2018, Google confirmed that the built-in ad blocker for the
Chrome Chrome may refer to: Materials * Chrome plating, a process of surfacing with chromium * Chrome alum, a chemical used in mordanting and photographic film Computing * Google Chrome, a web browser developed by Google ** ChromeOS, a Google Chrome- ...
/
Chromium Chromium is a chemical element with the symbol Cr and atomic number 24. It is the first element in group 6. It is a steely-grey, lustrous, hard, and brittle transition metal. Chromium metal is valued for its high corrosion resistance and hardne ...
browsers would go live on 15 February: this ad blocker only blocks certain ads as specified by the ''Better Ads Standard'' (defined by the Coalition for ''Better Ads'', in which Google itself is a board member). This built-in ad blocking mechanism is disputed because it could unfairly benefit Google's advertising itself. In 2019, both Apple and Google began to make changes to their web browsers' extension systems which encourage the use of declarative content blocking using pre-determined filters processed by the web browser, rather than filters processed at runtime by the extension. Both vendors have imposed limits on the number of entries that may be included in these lists, which have led to (especially in the case of Chrome) allegations that these changes are being made to inhibit the effectiveness of ad blockers.


External programs

A number of external software applications offer ad filtering as a primary or additional feature. A traditional solution is to customize an HTTP proxy (or web proxy) to filter content. These programs work by caching and filtering content before it is displayed in a user's browser. This provides an opportunity to remove not only ads but also content that may be offensive, inappropriate, or even malicious (
Drive-by download Drive-by download is of two types, each concerning the unintended download of computer software from the Internet: # Authorized drive-by downloads are downloads which a person has authorized but without understanding the consequences (e.g. down ...
). Popular proxy software which blocks content effectively include
Netnanny Net Nanny is a content-control software suite marketed primarily towards parents as a way to monitor and control their child's computer and phone activity. Features The original version of Net Nanny released in 1994 was a web browser that could f ...
,
Privoxy Privoxy is a free non- caching web proxy with filtering capabilities for enhancing privacy, manipulating cookies and modifying web page data and HTTP headers before the page is rendered by the browser. Privoxy is a "privacy enhancing proxy", fil ...
,
Squid True squid are molluscs with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight arms, and two tentacles in the superorder Decapodiformes, though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also called squid despite not strictly fitting t ...
, and some content-control software. The main advantage of the method is freedom from implementation limitations (browser, working techniques) and centralization of control (the proxy can be used by many users). Proxies are very good at filtering ads, but they have several limitations compared to browser-based solutions. For proxies, it is difficult to filter Transport Layer Security (SSL) (https://) traffic and full webpage context is not available to the filter. As well, proxies find it difficult to filter JavaScript-generated ad content.


Hosts file and DNS manipulation

Most operating systems, even those which are aware of the Domain Name System (DNS), still offer backward compatibility with a locally administered list of foreign hosts. This configuration, for historical reasons, is stored in a flat text file that by default contains very few hostnames and their associated IP addresses. Editing this hosts file is simple and effective because most DNS clients will read the local hosts file before querying a remote
DNS server A name server refers to the server component of the Domain Name System (DNS), one of the two principal namespaces of the Internet. The most important function of DNS servers is the translation (resolution) of human-memorable domain names (example. ...
. Storing
black-hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass can defo ...
entries in the hosts file prevents the browser from accessing an ad server by manipulating the name resolution of the ad server to a local or nonexistent IP address (127.0.0.1 or 0.0.0.0 are typically used for IPv4 addresses). While simple to implement, these methods can be circumvented by advertisers, either by hard-coding, the IP address of the server that hosts the ads (this, in its turn, can be worked around by changing the local routing table by using for example iptables or other blocking firewalls), or by loading the advertisements from the same server that serves the main content; blocking name resolution of this server would also block the useful content of the site. Using a DNS sinkhole by manipulating the hosts file exploits the fact that most operating systems store a file with IP address, domain name pairs which is consulted by most browsers before using a DNS server to look up a domain name. By assigning the loopback address to each known ad server, the user directs traffic intended to reach each ad server to the local machine or to a virtual black hole of
/dev/null In some operating systems, the null device is a device file that discards all data written to it but reports that the write operation succeeded. This device is called /dev/null on Unix and Unix-like systems, NUL: (see TOPS-20) or NUL on CP/M an ...
or
bit bucket In computing jargon, the bit bucket (or byte bucket) is where lost computerized data has gone, by any means; any data which does not end up where it is supposed to, being lost in transmission, a computer crash, or the like, is said to have g ...
.


DNS filtering

Advertising can be blocked by using a DNS server which is configured to block access to domains or hostnames which are known to serve ads by spoofing the address. Users can choose to use an already modified DNS server or set up a dedicated device running adequate software such as a Raspberry Pi running Pi-hole themselves. Manipulating DNS is a widely employed method to manipulate what the end-user sees from the Internet but can also be deployed locally for personal purposes. China runs its own root DNS and the EU has considered the same. Google has required their
Google Public DNS Google Public DNS is a Domain Name System (DNS) service offered to Internet users worldwide by Google. It functions as a recursive name server. Google Public DNS was announced on December 3, 2009, in an effort described as "making the web faster ...
be used for some applications on its
Android Android may refer to: Science and technology * Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), Google's mobile operating system ** Bugdroid, a Google mascot sometimes referred to ...
devices. Accordingly, DNS addresses/domains used for advertising may be extremely vulnerable to a broad form of ad substitution whereby a domain that serves ads is entirely swapped out with one serving more local ads to some subset of users. This is especially likely in countries, notably Russia, India and
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
, where advertisers often refuse to pay for clicks or page views. DNS-level blocking of domains for non-commercial reasons is already common in China.


Recursive Local VPN

On Android, apps can run a local VPN connection with its own host filtering ability and DNS address without requiring root access. This approach allows ad blocking app to download ad blocking host files and use them to filter out ad networks throughout the device.
AdGuard Developed by AdGuard Software Limited, AdGuard offers open-source, free, and shareware products. AdGuard's DNS app supports Microsoft Windows, Linux, macOS, Android and iOS. AdGuard is also available as a browser extension. AdGuard Soft ...
, Blokada, DNS66, and RethinkDNS are few of the popular apps which accomplish ad blocking without root permission. The ad blocking is only active when the local VPN is turned on, and it completely stops when the VPN connection is disconnected. The convenience makes it easy to access content blocked by anti-adblock scripts. This approach optimizes battery usage, reduces internet slowdown caused by using external DNS or VPN ad blocking and needs overall less configuration.


Hardware devices

Devices such as AdTrap or Pi-hole use hardware to block Internet advertising. Based on reviews of AdTrap, this device uses a Linux Kernel running a version of PrivProxy to block ads from video streaming, music streaming, and any web browser, while PiHole act as local DNS to block advertisement servers, stopping connected devices from showing most ads. Another such solution is provided for network-level ad blocking for telcos by Israeli startup Shine.


By external parties and internet providers

Internet providers, especially mobile operators, frequently offer proxies designed to reduce network traffic. Even when not targeted specifically at ad filtering, these proxy-based arrangements will block many types of advertisements that are too large or bandwidth-consuming, or that are otherwise deemed unsuited for the specific internet connection or target device. Many internet operators block some form of advertisements while at the same time injecting their own ads promoting their services and specials.


Economic consequences for online business

Some content providers have argued that widespread ad blocking results in decreased revenue to a website sustained by advertisements and e-commerce-based businesses, where this blocking can be detected. Some have argued that since advertisers are ultimately paying for ads to increase their own revenues, eliminating ad blocking would only dilute the value per impression and drive down the price of advertising, arguing that like click fraud, impressions served to users who use ad blockers are of little to no value to advertisers. Consequently, they argue, eliminating ad blocking would not increase overall ad revenue to content providers in the long run.


Business models

Tools that help block ads have to work on different business models to stay in operation: * Free and open source: Several tools work under a FOSS model, powered by community contributions and donations, e.g. uBlock Origin * Whitelisting: Companies have resorted to maintaining a whitelist against a share of the ad revenue to allow "acceptable ads". This has faced criticism, such as Adblock Plus * Subscription/Upfront: Some companies in this field have started a subscription or upfront payment model for the tools, e.g. Wipr * Freemium: Other companies offer some level of service for free while charge for additional features, e.g.
AdGuard Developed by AdGuard Software Limited, AdGuard offers open-source, free, and shareware products. AdGuard's DNS app supports Microsoft Windows, Linux, macOS, Android and iOS. AdGuard is also available as a browser extension. AdGuard Soft ...


Response from publishers


Countermeasures

Some websites have taken countermeasures against ad blocking software, such as attempting to detect the presence of ad blockers and informing users of their views, or outright preventing users from accessing the content unless they disable the ad blocking software, whitelist the website, or buy an "ad-removal pass". There have been several arguments supporting and opposing the assertion that blocking ads is wrong. Indeed, there is evidence to show that these countermeasures may hurt a website's SEO performance, as users unwilling to turn off their AdBlock, may instead go to a competitor's website listed in the search results. Due to the little amount of time the user spends on the website, and the greater time spent on a competitor's, search engines may view the webpage less favourably and reduce its search ranking. The back-and-forth elevation of technologies used for ad-blocking and countering ad-blocking have been equated to an "ad blocking war" or "arms race" between all parties. It has been suggested that in the European Union, the practice of websites scanning for ad blocking software may run afoul of the E-Privacy Directive. This claim was further validated by IAB Europe's guidelines released in June 2016 stating that there indeed may be a legal issue in ad blocker detection. While some anti-blocking stakeholders have tried to refute this it seems safe to assume that Publishers should follow the guidelines provided by the main Publisher lobby IAB. The joint effort announced by IAB Sweden prior to IAB Europe's guideline on the matter never materialized, and would have most likely been found against European anti-competition laws if it did. In August 2017, a vendor, Admiral, of such counter-measures issued a demand under section 1201 of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act, to demand the removal of a domain name associated with their service from an ad-blocking filter list. The vendor argued that the domain constituted a component of a technological protection measure designed to protect a copyrighted work, and thus made it a violation of anti-circumvention law to frustrate access to it.


Alternatives

As of 2015, advertisers and marketers look to involve their brands directly into the entertainment with native advertising and
product placement Product placement, also known as embedded marketing, is a marketing technique where references to specific brands or products are incorporated into another work, such as a film or television program, with specific promotional intent. Much of th ...
(also known as brand integration or embedded marketing). An example of product placement would be for a soft drink manufacturer to pay a
reality TV Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring unfamiliar people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 19 ...
show producer to have the show's cast and host appear onscreen holding cans of the soft drink. Another common product placement is for an automotive manufacturer to give free cars to the producers of a TV show, in return for the show's producer depicting characters using these vehicles during the show. Some digital publications turned to their customers for help as a form of tip jar. For example, '' The Guardian'' is asking its readers for donations to help offset falling advertising revenue. According to the newspaper's editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, the newspaper gets about the same amount of money from membership and donations as it does from advertising. The newspaper considered preventing readers from accessing its content if usage of ad-blocking software becomes widespread, but so far it keeps the content accessible for readers who employ ad-blockers. A new service called Scroll, launched in January 2020, worked with several leading website publishers to create a subscription model for ad-free browsing across all supported websites. Users would pay Scroll directly, and portions of the subscription fees are doled out to the websites based on proportional view count.


See also

* Adware * Adversarial information retrieval * Content-control software * Criticism of advertising *
Content filter An Internet filter is software that restricts or controls the content an Internet user is capable to access, especially when utilized to restrict material delivered over the Internet via the Web, Email, or other means. Content-control software dete ...
* Commercial skipping * DNSBL *
Hosts file filtering The computer file hosts is an operating system file that maps hostnames to IP addresses. It is a plain text file. Originally a file named HOSTS.TXT was manually maintained and made available via file sharing by Stanford Research Institute for the ...
*
Malvertising Malvertising (a portmanteau of "malicious software (malware) advertising") is the use of online advertising to spread malware. It typically involves injecting malicious or malware-laden advertisements into legitimate online advertising networks ...
*
Privacy Privacy (, ) is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves, and thereby express themselves selectively. The domain of privacy partially overlaps with security, which can include the concepts of a ...
*
Proxomitron Proxomitron, the Universal Web Filter, is a filtering web proxy written by Scott R. Lemmon. This program was originally designed to run under Windows 95. All future development of the program was ceased in 2003 just one year before its author' ...


References

{{Reflist Advertising-free media Anti-spam Online advertising Promotion and marketing communications