
Measuring and Disrupting Anti-Adblockers Using Differential Execution Analysis [pdf] - dedalus
http://homepage.divms.uiowa.edu/~mshafiq/files/adblock-ndss2018.pdf
======
gottam
This is probably not an arms race ad companies want to play. Someone who has
an adblocker installed is unlikely to be respective to ads, and by installing
an adblocker they currently are opting out of from the ad vendors metrics.
which is better than adblock vendors trying to feign ads loading or "interest"
in the ads, such as addons like [https://adnauseam.io](https://adnauseam.io)

So its debatable even they would win the ad arms race, but they would also
lose credibility in their own metrics as the easiest solution will be to start
fooling ad companies that their ads are loading.

~~~
mehrdadn
> Someone who has an adblocker installed is unlikely to be respective to ads

Any statistics to believe this is true? I know for a fact it's false for
myself because I do sometimes click on ads when I don't block them.

~~~
gottam
I never said it doesn't happen. You're the odd case and of course there's
someone who had adblock installed for them. I just said "unlikely", because
they went out of their way to install the adblocker.

~~~
Feniks
I myself will go to any length to avoid advertising. Luckily its pretty easy.

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leeoniya
if it weren't for CDNs, simply blocking all 3rd party domains is the fastest,
most reliable and secure way to block ads and greatly reduce bandwidth.

i highly recommend running both uMatrix and uBlock Origin. then whitelist cdns
on a per-domain basis.

with the amount of tech and data available these days, google still chooses to
show me an ad for chevy on an ice cream site. the fact that the ads are so
obviously out of context is truly baffling - does this seriously work for the
general consumer? even if i've searched for chevy before, why would i suddenly
exit my ice cream experience?

if ads were contextually better, less distracting and less bandwidth/perf
impactful, i may actually be convinced to view them. unfortunately none of
these things are true.

~~~
coolso
> with the amount of tech and data available these days, google still chooses
> to show me an ad for chevy on an ice cream site. the fact that the ads are
> so obviously out of context is truly baffling - does this seriously work for
> the general consumer? even if i've searched for chevy before, why would i
> suddenly exit my ice cream experience?

The point of that particular ad is likely less to get you to click and more to
remind you that Chevy exists and is important. So when you go buy that new or
used car, Chevy goes through your mind at least once, and you subconsciously
have some trust in the brand because you are reminded of its existence through
various outlets on a daily basis, which is naturally comforting when done
correctly.

It’s not really any different from seeing a Tide laundry detergeny commercial
while watching South Park. What’s tide got to do with a cartoon, and are you
going to run out immediately and buy some Tide during the break? No, but next
time you go to the store to buy detergent you’ll see Tide and while you might
not buy it you’ll at least be familiar with it in a relatively positive
manner, which for most will make the chances of them buying it higher.

~~~
leeoniya
except that i researched chevy thoroughly and decided that it sucked. now i
have to go and purge what google thinks it knows about me. and theoretically
repeat this process for every other ad network, but this is neither possible
nor practical.

~~~
coolso
Point is, you researched Chevy heavily.

Not everyone is going to buy Chevy but almost everyone is going to research
Chevy. The role of Chevy ads being shown to everyone plays a role in this. So
a Chevy ad still is “relevant” even on an ice cream site.

~~~
marcosdumay
Hum... The GP is almost certainly seeing those Chevy ads because he researched
it. Not the other way around.

That's how tracking ads (don't) work. You usually get ads for things you just
brought (or decided not to), hoping that you didn't actually buy it yet or
will buy more than once, and the medium can intermediate the transaction.

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paulie_a
There was an article the other day on HN regarding mental burnout of ads.

This morning I decided to count the ads on a news article, there were 14
between sponsored bs and banner ads. Every single one was complete garbage.

Click here to find out how the tech and ad industry are lowering the bar at a
"shocking" rate

~~~
InternetUser
What would be an example of a non-garbage ad that could've been there?

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mirimir
This is a very cool approach for detecting anti-adblocking.

However, I don't quite get the point for disruption. That is, it seems
necessary to load pages at least twice, and then do some computation. How does
that help users who are concerned about privacy, throughput or CPU load?

~~~
mrob
This is a technique for automatically generating anti-anti-adblocking rules.
They'll be added to the block lists, so you won't have to generate them each
time, only when the anti-adblocking script changes enough to break them.

~~~
mirimir
Doh. Thanks.

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taxreform
According to the paper, they seem to have modified Chromium's JavaScript
engine in order to record execution paths of JavaScript code. Does anyone know
exactly how they modified Chromium (or preferably the exact patch they applied
to Chromium)?

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notaboutdave
Cross-browser support for WebAssembly was the death knell for ad blockers.

~~~
mrob
Worst case scenario, we can sandbox the whole browser and detect ads visually.

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inetknght
Let me know how that works when the website "requires" DRM to function.

~~~
nsgi
Probably about as well as most forms of DRM...

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jamiequint
This is pretty immoral. Companies that create or provide content should at the
very least be able to decide if they want to serve you content if you don't
agree to see ads with it (or pay for it). How is it moral to effectively force
someone to allow you to see the content you want to see without compensating
them for it.

~~~
mnthaeo98htnn
This is like saying that it's immoral to change the channel whenever ads come
on the TV or radio, or to use the mute button on your TV. It is in no way
immoral. The way HTML works is your browser sends a request for resources it
wants, then renders them for you. IF you don't send the request for resources
you don't want, that's not immoral. If it affects the web sites' businesses,
then the onus is on them to come up with a model that works. There are other
reasonable free models, such as those used by public TV and public radio.

~~~
jamiequint
You _are_ sending the request for the resources though, e.g. if you load
facebook.com there isn't a separate request for ads, they are just loaded as
part of the feed. It's very much within their right (contractually) to
encumber your usage of the site to rendering the full page as it's served to
you. Attempting to fool them into thinking you're rendering the content as
presented while you do not actually do that (as a result, imposing on them a
net revenue loss) is clearly immoral.

You don't agree to a TOS by watching TV and listening to the radio, the
internet is fundamentally different from those media.

~~~
Nadya
That isn't how the internet works. It's a series of requests and at any point
some requests can be rejected. Whether that request was critical for site
functionality depends on what request that was.

Consenting to requests from google.com does not guarantee or imply consent
from adservices.google.com, so if google.com tells my browser to please fetch
resources from adservices.google.com I'll tell them to go away.

Personally, I use a giant blocklist [0] of domains I do not wish to request
resources from.

As a comparison, if you invite _a_ friend to your house do you expect them to
show up with 50 other people? Would you be upset with your friend for assuming
it would be okay to invite other people to your house without your consent? Is
it morally wrong to tell your friend they may not bring other friends to your
house without your approval? If you agreed to letting them bring friends over,
are you okay with _any_ friends or is their neo-nazi friend not allowed?

[0] [http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/](http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/)

 _> You don't agree to a TOS by watching TV and listening to the radio, the
internet is fundamentally different from those media._

You don't agree to a TOS by visiting a website either. Agreement is usually
done when registering an account and even those are limited in any legal
ability to enforce it.

~~~
parenthephobia
> If you invite a friend to your house do you expect them to show up with 50
> other people?

But if you say no, your friend has the choice of whether to come alone.

Anti-anti-adblocking systems prevent your friend from making that choice.

~~~
Nadya
In theory, content would not be delivered until the ads have been fetched and
reported that they've been delivered. In practice, that isn't a realistic
option. Not because it isn't technically possible - but because people are
impatient and expect near instant load times and this would slow things down a
tiny bit.

The anti-adblocking systems are the equivalent of coming over anyway but
complaining about not being able to bring 50 friends the entire time. Anti-
anti-adblocking systems are telling them to shut up or don't come over.

There's something to be said about people who repeatedly invite the friend
over who constantly complains about not being able to bring 50 friends. I tend
to respect sites who ask me to disable my ad blocker: I just won't visit their
website.

A low traffic site doesn't make enough to sustain from ads. The proper
response isn't to push traffic away - it's to find a business model that
works. Ad based models are increasingly _not working_.

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tanilama
Won't be very useful. The internet is turning to subscription model very
quickly.

~~~
votepaunchy
And most subscription sites still show ads.

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lainon
related I guess?

[http://homepage.divms.uiowa.edu/~mshafiq/files/adblock-
imc20...](http://homepage.divms.uiowa.edu/~mshafiq/files/adblock-imc2017.pdf)

[http://homepage.divms.uiowa.edu/~mshafiq/files/adblock-
pets2...](http://homepage.divms.uiowa.edu/~mshafiq/files/adblock-pets2017.pdf)

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gpderetta
. Edit: failed at reading comprehension

