Live data from Hacker News

Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

optimal.com

91–98 of 98 posts

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well... what DNS are you currently using now? Isn't a 3rd party? I had 8.8.8.8 so I guess the switch is no-brainer

In fact, I have my own DNS server running ;) But if I had not: - My ISP whose DNS I used, is subject to strong regulations and laws here - "Additional" 3rd parties are more out of control from this perspective, therefore a significant higher risk, imho I agree, when you used google DNS before, it's same same...

In the US, at least where I've lived, most consumer ISPs will hijack nxdomain to their own search engine, which allows them to display ads and sign deals with search engines and make some cash on the side.

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#93
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should hook him up with his old work address! I actually went on an adventure of re-registering old company addresses a few years ago.

Interesting question-> how would he prove that he once had that address? :)

The internet will do it for you. http://www.the-email-archive.com/email-data-jgc-optimal-com-...

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi I'm the CEO of Optimal, Rob. We use open source lists of adservers but have had to evolve from those lists since some of them are invalid or overly aggressive. We do not and will never make decisions about what to block based on being paid by any of these companies. We are building a consumer filtering system, and we are responsible to consumers. If you try it out and find any sites that don't work as intended ple…

Hi, Will you switch over to a paid service once you're out of beta? Also what's your policy on logging? Below (a probably outdated list of) privacy enhanced servers that don't log. # Swiss Privacy Foundation http://www.privacyfoundation.ch/de/service/server.html 77.109.138.45 77.109.139.29 # www.censurfridns.dk http://www.censurfridns.dk/ 91.239.100.100 89.233.43.71 # CCC http://www.ccc.de/censorship/dns-howto 85.214…

http://wiki.opennicproject.org/ClosestT2Servers

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi I'm the CEO of Optimal, Rob. We use open source lists of adservers but have had to evolve from those lists since some of them are invalid or overly aggressive. We do not and will never make decisions about what to block based on being paid by any of these companies. We are building a consumer filtering system, and we are responsible to consumers. If you try it out and find any sites that don't work as intended ple…

Hi, Will you switch over to a paid service once you're out of beta? Also what's your policy on logging? Below (a probably outdated list of) privacy enhanced servers that don't log. # Swiss Privacy Foundation http://www.privacyfoundation.ch/de/service/server.html 77.109.138.45 77.109.139.29 # www.censurfridns.dk http://www.censurfridns.dk/ 91.239.100.100 89.233.43.71 # CCC http://www.ccc.de/censorship/dns-howto 85.214…

I assume no statement from their CEO is also kind of a statement.

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"An "ethical" ad blocking service " All ad-blocking is ethical. It's the advertisers job to make me aware of products in a way that doesn't anger me, and they're doing a really shitty job.

When you adblock instead of not using adblock websites lose money.

They have lost nothing, the money wasn't theirs to begin with.

They don't have the right to decide how users computers should behave when rendering pages.

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, Will you switch over to a paid service once you're out of beta? Also what's your policy on logging? Below (a probably outdated list of) privacy enhanced servers that don't log. # Swiss Privacy Foundation http://www.privacyfoundation.ch/de/service/server.html 77.109.138.45 77.109.139.29 # www.censurfridns.dk http://www.censurfridns.dk/ 91.239.100.100 89.233.43.71 # CCC http://www.ccc.de/censorship/dns-howto 85.214…

We will not - we intend to keep this service free. We hope that some portion of people sign up for our publisher tips, to reward journalists for great content. We take a percentage of they but just as I have publicly said most publishers should NOT block ad blocking users but it's up to them, we hope to provide an optional mechanism for people to pay. Longer term we think a lot of advertising is transformed by softwa…

pretty cool, would probably be good if you mention the non-logging in your ToS or somewhere in an official statement. or by using a warrant canary clause somewhere ...

ask them to add you to:

https://wikileaks.org/wiki/Alternative_DNS

Re: Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

#98
post #5

One can achieve this locally, on a laptop/desktop, using https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts Or you can combine that with https://github.com/jlund/streisand to have a VPN service that happens to adblock (great for mobile). That said... I like that Optimal have made this too, because neither of the above can work for all devices in a household and more things in the house are tracking you and serving adverts (TV!). T…

If you want StevenBlack's hosts list to be network-wide I integrated it with an open source, self-hosted DNS server called https://pi-hole.net/ last week which adds a slick admin interface and browser extensions too, then I put it all in a Vagrantfile and set my router to use the VM as a DNS server. Screenshot: https://i.imgur.com/ELL9CDu.png Vagrantfile: https://github.com/benlowry/pihole-extended-hosts

Is it possible to marry this to Bind9?
Post reply on HN