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Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

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Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#131

Post by pauloday »

aub3bhat wrote: post #80
downandout wrote: post #36

The article puts a significant emphasis on the idea that bulletproof ad-blocking technology, assuming that's what this turns out to be in practice, will work long-term becuase of legal restrictions imposed by the FTC. If Google, Facebook, or other multi-billion dollar entities detect an existential threat arising from this or any other technology, rest assured that the laws will change as quickly as is necessary to k…

Or simply a hardened browser DMCA, with signed write-or-execute JS VM that ensures that integrity of the page as rendered cannot be messed with by some pesky extension.

But then people could just get a list of ad hosts and modify their hosts.txt to redirect those addresses to localhost. I think there's other ways to stop this though. It doesn't seem like a huge stretch for ad providers to give hosts all the stuff to host the ad from their server directly, for example.

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#132

Post by betenoire »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #95

Does this cover the issue of tracking, etc? It seems that in order to detect/block the ad, it must allow it to load - and at that point, the malicious payload is already on my machine, and I've already spent part of my precious allotted bandwidth on someone's idea of profit-making.

This is my thought as well. I avoid ads because of the additional resources they require, network requests, javascript, etc. Not because my eyes can't handle them

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#133

Post by sdabdoub »

ams6110 wrote: post #42

I use a hosts file, and uBlock Origin. I can't remember the last time I've seen an ad on a website. I'm thinking there's not a lot of room for improvement.

There's a lot of background work to keep uBlock and other services current. A hosts file needs updating when domains change or new ones are added.

That's part of the appeal of this approach, it doesn't matter what domains ads are served from.

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#134

Post by derefr »

imglorp wrote: post #117
make3 wrote: post #75

Just change the alpha values in the `coverContainer` function in `utils.js` and it actually blocks ads. Patched `utils.js`: https://pastebin.com/YLyN2uJ8

Covering is not as good as not loading. Loading brings all the malware, the tracking, and the bandwidth/load times.

"Not loading" doesn't make sense in the case where the ad is inline in the response body (i.e. "part of the site", like Facebook's ads are.) Which is the case where this ad-blocker uniquely shines.

Besides which, the algorithm involved is a computer-vision one, so the ad needs to be rendered before the algorithm can recognize it as an ad.

The best solution here, if you want maximum privacy, would be to use a traditional ad-blocker as a first-line defence, and this algorithm as a second-line, for the ads which make it past regular ad-blocking (and which are therefore probably inline-content ads anyway.)

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#135

Post by [deleted] »

jkoebler wrote: post #126
make3 wrote: post #75

Just change the alpha values in the `coverContainer` function in `utils.js` and it actually blocks ads. Patched `utils.js`: https://pastebin.com/YLyN2uJ8

Hey—I wrote this article ... if anyone forks this and makes it real please let me know. @jason_koebler on twitter or jason.koebler@vice.com

[deleted]

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#136

Post by wnevets »

drumttocs8 wrote: post #74
downandout wrote: post #36

The article puts a significant emphasis on the idea that bulletproof ad-blocking technology, assuming that's what this turns out to be in practice, will work long-term becuase of legal restrictions imposed by the FTC. If Google, Facebook, or other multi-billion dollar entities detect an existential threat arising from this or any other technology, rest assured that the laws will change as quickly as is necessary to k…

I can see it now... "Advertisements are a form of free speech. Corporations are people too."

This was the argument telemarketers used, it was their right to call you and try to sell you crap you don't need!

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#137

Post by accountyaccount »

skybrian wrote: post #123
downandout wrote: post #36

The article puts a significant emphasis on the idea that bulletproof ad-blocking technology, assuming that's what this turns out to be in practice, will work long-term becuase of legal restrictions imposed by the FTC. If Google, Facebook, or other multi-billion dollar entities detect an existential threat arising from this or any other technology, rest assured that the laws will change as quickly as is necessary to k…

This is too cynical. You can be sure there will be lobbyists involved making the case for companies affected, but this does not guarantee results . Any business plan where there's government involved is risky. Heck, even with a Republican-controlled Congress, the Republicans can't always get their agenda passed because they don't even agree among themselves what it is. Nobody can rest easy that Congress will do what…

>Nobody can rest easy that Congress will do what they want.

Given enough money, I think you definitely can.

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#138

Post by Rmilb »

pjc50 wrote: post #62
dpflan wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HTTP 402's and cryptocurrencies (fractional payments for access)? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7857236 I remember talking to a friend who was trying out 21co's "bitcoin" computer and that 402+cryptocurrency payment seemed like something to evolve from that project. It seems to have changed focus a bit since that discussion. https://21.co/

Isn't there a global limit of 3 bitcoin transactions per second and a cost of about $10 in electricity too? 21.co was an obvious scam with near zero sales.

7 trans actions per seconds. But there are several changes in the pipline to fix this. One solution is having "off-chain" transactions not on the main blockchain, this would allow us to not record every coffee purchase made in bitcoin to be stored on the main chain. Look up Lightning Network if you are interested in how this is being done. Your main point is correct that Bitcoin can only handle 7 tps while Visa can handle 20,000 tps.

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#139

Post by Rmilb »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #23
news_to_me wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm hoping it would be something based on micropayments, maybe through a service like flattr. That would keep content accessible (for a small, affordable fee) and completely block out the bad actors (i.e. advertisers).

I've been hearing lots of good things about Patreon, especially from Youtube personalities. I haven't heard of Flattr being used much recently.

Flattr just got got bought by Adblock Plus...

Re: Princeton’s Ad-Blocker May Put an End to the Ad-Blocking Arms Race

#140

Post by deno »

aub3bhat wrote: post #81
drumttocs8 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see it now... "Advertisements are a form of free speech. Corporations are people too."

Advertisements are a form of free speech. 6 vs 3 Supreme Court " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorrell_v._IMS_Health_Inc . "

If ads are protected free speech how are tobacco ads illegal?
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