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AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

adnauseam.io

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Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#231

Post by _audakel »

heroprotagonist wrote: post #174
Analemma_ wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes? I'm honestly not sure how you could think otherwise. This is a clickbot just like any other.

It's arguable. Fraud generally requires intent to result in financial or personal gain. There's no gain here for the user. There's gain for the advertising company at the expense of the company purchasing the advertisements. But the advertising company is supposed to well-qualify their targets, right? It's on them for serving and charging for advertisements to people who don't want them or will 'click them' regardles…

There is gain for the user, in the respect that they receive the service of their privacy being protected

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#232

Post by recursive »

hedora wrote: post #87
menegattig wrote: post #7

Few month ago we developed and launched an AI-based AdBlocker (called AdFilter) and also had several problems with Google Chrome Web Store. Almost every week they had a "strange reason" to remove our extension from the Google Chrome Web Store. We had more than 380,000 DAU (Daily Active Users) from 36 countries with all good feedbacks on Google Chrome Web Store, but even so, Google always tried to find a way to get us…

I'm surprised people still use Chrome and not Chromium. Perhaps a few devs in your situation could improve the Chromium installation flow for Windows, etc. Google doesn't have much incentive to make it easy, but third parties (like Debian) do, and do a lot of the heavy lifting on an ongoing basis.

I can't even figure out how to install a stable version of Chromium. I only spent two minutes trying, but installing Chrome consists of one web search and one button click, so the difference is pretty obvious to me.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#233

Post by doodpants »

notahacker wrote: post #134
nilved wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you trying to relate clicking ads to smashing up merchandise?

Both actions are done with the stated intent of costing the target money. Sure, it only involves accessing URLs the public is actively encouraged to visit (in a manner intended to bring the system down) but so do many DDoS attacks...

Can you cite any evidence that the "stated" intent of AdNauseam is to cost the target money? According to their video, the intent is to protect the user's privacy by preventing advertisers from building an accurate personal profile of the user. You may argue that this has the effect of costing the advertisers money, but just because that is a result, doesn't make it the primary goal. It's certainly not AdNauseam's fault if the advertiser's business model depends on violating user privacy.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#234

Post by _audakel »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #152
Spoom wrote: post #29

At the risk of downvotes: Is anyone really surprised? AdNauseam is silently clicking ads. This directly costs Google money . Google happens to control the extension web store for their own browser. Removing it from the store really isn't that bad. Uninstalling it from existing browsers as malware? A little more malicious, but I would still consider it self defense. There is even a method to install it directly[1] whi…

No (it doesn't surprise me). I figured it would be banned at some point, it is essentially click fraud but with a (noble?) purpose. And once it reaches enough critical mass to be annoying (and by annoying I mean interfering with other analytics) it would be dealt with. I certainly resonate with the issue of advertising getting ridiculous (and love Troy Hunt's response) but don't begrudge Google their right to not hel…

It's important to separate the distinction between legal and illegal, and right versus wrong (morality). the two are sometimes correlated but they do not necessarily have to be. It's much easier to prove something legal or illegal because you just look at the laws on the books. It's like a mathematical proof. It doesn't have to be morally correct but it can still be legal.

The holdup are people confusing this click fraud with immoral. It seems to be very clearly illegal by the books, but in my opinion a moral and right thing to do

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#235

Post by jlarocco »

blauditore wrote: post #39
iUsedToCode wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's supposed to mess up the stats and inject uncertainty into ad analysis. They are trying to bring down the price of ads on the internet, thus making them unprofitable. I hope they succeed.

I find it a bit harsh to be so hostile towards online ads. After all, it's has been a significant source of income for innovative companies or services that couldn't exist otherwise, because users are notoriously reluctant to pay for virtual goods. Yes, tracking and overly intrusive fullpage popups are real issues, but not all ads are inherently evil.

I strongly disagree, and feel the overall utility and usability of the internet has been negatively affected by advertisements.

Companies that can't survive by selling a product or service directly probably should go out of business, IMO.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#236

Post by _audakel »

malka wrote: post #85
Artemis2 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried earlier today in Chrome Canary in developer mode and after a short while the extension disabled itself. When I try to enable it back again the console on the Extensions page says "Unchecked runtime.lastError while running management.setEnabled: Extension kkendhmcacabobepidajpejenjinojhp cannot be modified by user."

100% assholish on google side to disable side loading for a very specific extension. The good thing of course is that it shows that they are afraid of such an extension.

Can't you just Firefox with the extension? And then browse Google from there

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#237

Post by nilved »

notahacker wrote: post #134
nilved wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you trying to relate clicking ads to smashing up merchandise?

Both actions are done with the stated intent of costing the target money. Sure, it only involves accessing URLs the public is actively encouraged to visit (in a manner intended to bring the system down) but so do many DDoS attacks...

The stated intent of blocking ads is not to cost the target money.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#238

Post by ddebernardy »

downandout wrote: post #86
abhv wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can the Adsense distinguish whether it is AdNauseum clicking or the human clicking?

They probably can't, since it's an extension and thus uses the user's browser, IP, cookies etc (Adsense does use mouse tracking and other techniques that will likely flag these clicks as suspect, requiring additional analysis). Therein lies the problem. It appears to them as if someone is going and clicking on every ad, or is using an automated headless browser to click on ads. That can easily get you banned. Google…

> (Adsense does use mouse tracking and other techniques that will likely flag these clicks as suspect, requiring additional analysis). Therein lies the problem.

Actually, Google does track all of this stuff already:

http://adage.com/article/digital/inside-google-s-secret-war-...

Google could decide to just ignore IPs that host users that display this behavior pattern. But yeah, it's "easier" to just ban the offending Chrome extension.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#239

Post by Sir_Cmpwn »

fryguy wrote: post #222
mattlevan wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fraud? If a user wants to automate his browser to click all ads encountered as he surfs, that's fraud?

Yes. The intent is what's important to me. If it were an extension, like in the 90's when everyone was on dial-up, that pre-loaded links, and some of those links happened to be ads then that's one thing. The goal of that extension is to load pages faster since they've already been downloaded. That's not fraud. This extension clearly understands that links are ads and that clicking them will cost the advertiser money…

That's not how fraud works.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#240

Post by ben0x539 »

notahacker wrote: post #224
ben0x539 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of things costing a company money are perfectly reasonable and we rightly complain if a company sabotages them. Things like leaving negative reviews/ratings, receiving refunds for defective products or shopping around to compare prices ultimately hurt someone's bottom line, so I think we can expect better from an analogy here.

I think "indiscriminately bombard ad networks with the intent of sabotaging the ad network's business" is a lot closer to my DDoS example (or smashing up a store) than "if a product proves to be disappointing, exercise my statutory right to a refund and/or tell people about it". I'd also feel Google could and probably should remove browser extensions whose distinctive feature was that they automated the process of su…

I don't think you can reasonably frame clicking on too many ads as an act of sabotage. It's interfering with the metrics that some people who you don't necessarily have a business relationship use to make business decisions (like paying out money), but it's not obvious to me how you're obligated to be particularly cooperative in their gathering of the metrics. The system continues to work as intended, you're just not supplying it with the data its creators would ideally hope to receive. That also seems to contrast it with a DoS attack.

I agree that Google should probably remove browser extensions that are convincingly designed to facilitate actual fraud. I'd also be on board with Google removing a browser extension that was designed by a site operator to produce artificial clicks on ads on that particular site, since now there's someone involved who probably signed a thing saying they won't produce artificial clicks.

But my point with my examples was that you can harm someone's bottom line without it being fraud or otherwise illegal, so it doesn't just follow that if you harm someone's business, you're doing the equivalent of a DoS or smashing up their merchandise.

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