I always wondered why they didn't just do this in the first place. Despite having that much power Google always seemed oddly tolerant towards content blockers even when they were directly a slap on the face of their main offerings. Spoofing ads to act as first-party content through proxies was something I thought they were perfectly capable of making websites do with their existing behemoth network infrastructure. Surprising it actually took so long.
Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
271–280 of 902 posts
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#272Citing adblock feels like clickbait. Google Tag Manager can't run ads so I don't follow the comparison. Marketing analytics could always side-step anti-adblocking tools through server-side tracking.
Right. Everything in the article is wrong. GTM is still GTM and can be trivially blocked; the container itself isn't moving server-side. It's just gained the ability to proxy data to third parties instead of needing to load scripts for every tracker. This is better for performance, and should be explicitly in control of exactly what data is passed on to where. All you really lose is the ability to block a subset of a…
> GTM is still GTM and can be trivially blocked; the container itself isn't moving server-side.
Not when the script sending data to the server side GTM is a first party one.
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#273Actually this article strengthens my believe that adblockers will even become more essential. I mean, even if the server decides to send some ads, the client doesn't have to show them. Or am I missing something?
The client won't be able to distinguish between ads and actual content on the website if both come from the same source.
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#274Earlier quoted context omitted.
"I don't have the time or energy to block JavaScript and/or manually inspect each domain's requests to figure out if they use server-side tracking or not." By default, I don't run JavaScript. I don't see blocking JS as a problem - in fact, it's a blessing as the web is blinding fast without it - and also most of the ads just simply disappear if JS is not running. On occasions when I need JS (only about 3-5% of sites)…
> By default, I don't run JavaScript. I don't see blocking JS as a problem - in fact, it's a blessing as the web is blinding fast without it - and also most of the ads just simply disappear if JS is not running. Years ago I was on the "people who block JavaScript are crazy" bandwagon, until just loading a single news article online meant waiting for a dozen ads and autoplaying videos to load. I spent more time waitin…
> Years ago I was on the "people who block JavaScript are crazy" bandwagon, until just loading a single news article online meant waiting for a dozen ads and autoplaying videos to load.
Seems like clear case of "crossing the river to collect water" (as the Swedish saying says)? This is what I use uBlock Origin (with the right blocklists) for and it happens automagically. I did use uMatrix for quite a awhile, but eventually ended up ditching it because uBlock Origin worked so well.
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#275Isn't the solution then to recognize the GTM proxy and block anything that tries to talk to it?
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#276Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. Slavery was OK in the US for a long while. If things hadn't been done to get this changed in the US, it would still be seen as an OK thing to do, and in reality no higher power or law of nature would stop that, even in $current_year - evidenced by how worldwide modern slavery/forced labor is still going strong[0]. My point is that there is no correct moral compass, no general rule as to what behavior is good or…
Are you asserting that it is your current opinion that slavery was morally OK in the US, because it was morally accepted at the time? (Warning: this is a trap question, do not answer yes, the only socially accepted answer is no)
Dru,
I'm gonna take an adversarial point of view here. Wrong is wrong, and the magnitudes aren't really comparable at the resolution of the individual. At the maximum, according to Statista, there were about 4mn slaves. There are about 5bn people online, out of what is projected to be 8bn. While there are certainly cultural boundaries, that 5bn almost certainly interfaces with Google. So taking a step back and looking at the magnitude implied by the scale, and the outsized power of Google in virtually every facet of society, I wonder if it really is stepping out of line. Keyword dragnets, indefensible tracking... What's next?
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#277Pretty sure a big ban hammer is coming for Google with all such shenanigans, especially in trigger happy places like Europe and India who don't like their citizens tracked and are happy to create legislative bans. So you may win the cat and mouse adblock game but what are you gonna do when countries start making it illegal to use GA? (1) (1) https://www.forbes.com/sites/emmawoollacott/2022/02/10/frenc... ?
I'd wish so too but I don't see much that can happen in this context.
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#278Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does selling the data matter? If it's fine to collect but not sell it, people would already be fine with Google Ads tracking as Google is solely in possession of that data and will never sell it, lest their competitors gain an edge by out-header-bidding Google (offering higher profit margins to sites) with Google's own user data.
> Why does selling the data matter? It is somewhat galling for your private behavior to be monetized. But you're right that the selling itself is not the core issue. The core issue is that it's being shared . The monetization is an incentive to share, and that's where the problem lies. By contrast, think about your doctor: they can't legally sell your private data. If they share it with anyone, it is for the express…
> By contrast, think about your doctor: they can't legally sell your private data.
This is not a reasonable comparison. You choose to tell the doctor private information because of patient-doctor confidentiality. The other type of “private information” is collected by observing you in public (e.g. in a Walmart).
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#279Earlier quoted context omitted.
How about that government services must be built by the government?
Yes, I feel the same, at least for a lot of things. Certainly, all externally facing websites should be designed and maintained by gov't staff. From time to time, HN features high quality UK gov't websites. In the last five years, the UK gov't has made dramatic strides on "digital gov't" initiatives that benefit regular citizens. As I understand, most of those sites are built and maintained by gov't employees. This r…
Brit here. On your last point, there is no such widespread attitude in the UK towards government. We are historically conservative, but not libertarian. Don't forget two of the most famous and loved British institutions are the BBC and the NHS. I'm not saying such attitudes don't exist, because they do, but it's not "all-prevailing" by any stretch.
Re: Google Tag Manager, the new anti-adblock weapon (2020)
#280Earlier quoted context omitted.
How about that government services must be built by the government?
Yes, I feel the same, at least for a lot of things. Certainly, all externally facing websites should be designed and maintained by gov't staff. From time to time, HN features high quality UK gov't websites. In the last five years, the UK gov't has made dramatic strides on "digital gov't" initiatives that benefit regular citizens. As I understand, most of those sites are built and maintained by gov't employees. This r…
The trouble is, they're mostly Microsoft and either Azure or AWS behind the scenes. The UK government as a whole seems to love Microsoft. I just worry it will be out of the frying pan and into the fire...