Ad block

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Ad blocking is the practice of blocking advertisements, typically through automated means. Typical goals for doing this are reducing distractions, lowering the extent of data collection, decreasing resource usage (battery, network traffic, memory) and avoiding security threats that leverage advertising networks.

Consumer impact summary

Ad blocking is the crux of one of the most prominent conflicts around right of ownership, where users feel justified in deciding what their devices do or don't, while platforms that rely on advertising, especially those that offer free services to users, argue that advertisements sustain the platform and must remain untouched. Some platforms even actively detect ad blocking in order to display a relevant notice or to degrade functions of a service. This has turned into an arms race between advertisers and consumers.

Advertisements are increasingly showing up in devices (e.g., refrigerators, cars, televisions) built right into their system software, making ad blocking difficult.

There are efforts to use copyright law (e.g., DMCA/spotify/revanced, and German court case) to force consumers to play ads or run other programs on devices.

Ad Blocker Examples

Some of the add-ons / extensions / plug-ins below are not necessarily ad-blocking software but do contribute to blocking advertisements or reduce or eliminate the amount of data you share online.

Internet Browsers

A for Android, i for iOS, L for Linux, W for Windows

Browser base: C for Chromium, F for Firefox

If a browser is not listed "officially" for an add-on in the table below but shares the "Based on" attribute with a browser that is, it may (but is not guaranteed to) work with that browser.

	Based on	"Do Not Track" feature	DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials	NoScript	Privacy Badger	uBlock Origin
Brave	C
Chrome	C			L, W
DuckDuckGo	C	A
Edge	C			L, W
Firefox	F	A, L, W	A, L, W	A, L, W	A, L, W	A, L, W
Firefox Developer Edition	F	L, W	L, W	L, W	L, W	L, W
Mullvad Browser	F	L, W		L, W		L, W
Opera	C
Safari	-
Tor Browser	F	A, L, W		A, L, W
Vivaldi	C
Waterfox	F	L, W	L, W	L, W	L, W	L, W

Ad block Countermeasures

Dishonest countermeasures

2. Utilizing pop-ups & overlays to deter ad block usage

Owners & developers of domains & websites can detect ad blockers & make it significantly harder to access content by putting in countermeasures such as Pop-Ups & Overlays. Sometimes they go as far as using techniques that somewhat resemble the Consent-or-pay method in order to encourage others to disable their ad filtering tool.

Example of an anti ad block pop up resembling the "Consent-or-pay" tactic

See also

• Bloatware

Further Reading

• Advertising overload
• Ad blocking on Wikipedia