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Which Is Better, Adblock Or Adblock Plus?
An anonymous reader writes: Wladimir Palant is the creator of the Adblock Plus browser extension, but he often gets asked how it compares to a similar extension for Chrome called Adblock. In the past, he's told people the two extensions achieve largely the same end, but in slightly different ways. However, recent changes to the Adblock project have him worried. "AdBlock covertly moved from an open development model towards hiding changes from its users. Users were neither informed about that decision nor the reasons behind it." He goes through the changelog and highlights some updates that call into question the integrity of Adblock. For example, from an update on June 6th: "Calling home functionality has been extended. It now sends user's locale in addition to the unique user ID, AdBlock version, operating system and whether Google Search ads are being allowed. Also, AdBlock will tell getadblock.com (or any other website if asked nicely) whether AdBlock has just been installed or has been used for a while — again, in addition to the unique user ID." Of course, Palant has skin in this game, and Adblock Plus has dealt with fallout from their "acceptable ads policy," but at least it's still developed in the open.
Adblock Edge
If my customer has Firefox installed, I use Adblock Plus with it. That is also what I have on my own systems.
If they have Chrome instead, I use Adblock. I don't use Chrome, because I don't like its style, but several customers prefer it.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Works for me - I gave up on the other two
If the ads on a site are so obstructive or malicious that you want to block them then stop using that site. Blocking ads only encourages site operators to use more aggressive ad serving tactics and resorting to that kind of subsidized assault on the user is usually an indicator that the site doesn't have anything useful on it in the first place.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
The real question is: If you value privacy and dislike ads, why would you ever use Chrome?
The entire goal of that browser is counter to user Privacy and choice. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, if you don't care about that stuff then I'd same Chrome is probably the best browser out there. But I do value those things, and in fact they are probably my #1 consideration when choosing a browser so I use Firefox despite its many faults.
Still? Amongst the folks I work with, Chrome is dead. Listing uTorrent as malware was the straw that broke the camel's back. So, Adblock Plus FTW!
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
You'd not only rightly reject Google Chrome you'd also reject choice as a reason to favor nonfree software. Chrome is a nonfree browser so that is right out. A choice of nonfree programs doesn't satisfy what computer users need—software freedom. Choice is easily satisfied in that there's more than one alternative but choice of software says nothing about how well the alternatives address important needs to control one's computer (rather than letting the software control the users). So choice of software is a weak substitute for the freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify software.
Digital Citizen
I don't use Adblock, but I've been using this for years. I rarely see an ad unless it's served directly from the site I'm visiting, and it blocks a lot of malware as well. It has something like 16,000 entries, but doesn't seem to slow things down at all.
Part of the terms of the deal is they can not disclose the that they have new owners, who the new owners are, or any affiliations they have to the new owner, etc? But yes its now a spying tool and should not be trusted.
I have added question marks for legal protection.
I consider the default deny blocking of RequestPolicy essential.
I'm behind Ad Limiter, which limits Google search ads to one per page, picking the best one based on SiteTruth ratings. You can set it for zero search ads if you like. It also puts SiteTruth ratings on Google search results. It's a demo for SiteTruth search spam filtering.
This Mozilla/Chrome add on has a general ad-blocking mechanism inside. Unlike most ad blockers, it's not based on regular expressions looking for specific HTML. It finds URLs known to lead to ads, works outward through the DOM to find the ad boundary, then deletes the ad. So it's relatively insensitive to changes in ad code, and doesn't require much maintenance. The same code processes search results from Google, Bing, Yahoo, Bleeko, DuckDuckGo, and Infoseek. (Coming soon, Yandex support, and better handling of Google ads within ads, where an ad has multiple links.)
So, if I wanted to do a better ad blocker, I could do so easily. Should I? Is another one really needed? Are the headaches of running one worth it?
/etc/hosts
Install once, update if you care to, but it's not essential. Requires no configuration after installation, works for ALL browsers on your system with no setup, does not require the browser to "support" it in any way (i.e., extensions), never ever gets broken by browser updates, works on ancient computers with grossly out-of-date browsers. Works with ANY tcp/ip-based app on your system, really, so it lowers vectors for IM apps, Acrobat, etc.
The first computer I used it on was an 800 MHz G3 iBook with 640 MB RAM. Some people may say a large hosts file will slow down your computer, but I've never seen that happen myself in over a decade of using it on literally every computer I have.
It may not block EVERY ad like a dedicated extension does, but it comes really really close, and I like the fact that it works with all browsers and never requires updating. When I get a new computer, I put the hosts file on and pretty much never touch it again. A handful of sites (like hulu) will not work with an adblocker and it's a manual process to edit the file, but for unix types, that's not a problem. It blocks google's sponsored links so you may need to take that out too, for people who google "sears" and click the first (sponsored) link instead of the first actual link.
No reason not to do security in layers and use it WITH adblocking extensions, I suppose, but I've never felt the need to.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I wanted to throw point out Privacy Badger: https://www.eff.org/privacybad... Paid ads support many development teams, which creates/improves websites with better content It's not the ads so much, it's the tracking that I can do with out
Unfortunately, I cannot use Adblock Edge even though I like to, since I use Chrome. The Adblock Edge developer has shown no interest in making a Chrome version available.
And, yes, please don't tell me I need to be using Firefox - there are plenty of reasons why Chrome is preferable.
Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem.
I recently disabled AdBlock Plus --- after just using it for years unthinkingly --- and found my browser memory dropped by a third. Using Icecat ( = Firefox 24, because Firefox just sucks like a minimalistic Chrome twin now ), but also tested on my Firefox installation.
AdvertBan and Ghostery seem to do the same, without sucking RAM.
Proxomitron was WAY ahead of its' time. It is still installed and running wonderfully on a couple of my systems. If you simply *must* have something which is more recently actively developed then Proximodo may be more up your alley. It is fully compatible with all Proximodo filters, etc. but is lacking SSL support...
But there is a strong misconception that android is still FOSS. The phrase that comes to mind is the rug has been pulled from under them. I was surprised to learn to what lengths google has gone to lock down android. It was certainly a huge reason as to why a lot of the tech sector was pushing android in the early days (nothing gets the tech sector weaker in the knees than FOSS). While you are right, that users don't care, google has performed a massive bait and switch.
But there is a strong misconception that android is still FOSS. The phrase that comes to mind is the rug has been pulled from under them.
But that is exactly the point: did they notice? No. Google play services has been around for a couple of years now and for all the "evil" and "stealing of freedom" of proprietary software the end result is nothing, it has just been FOSS FUD. Were any great innovations born of free software trampled by this act? Nope.
1. To prevent junkware prompts during the initial install, download the installer from oracle instead of java.com, because the oracle installer does not have the junkware prompt:
http://www.oracle.com/technetw...
(searching for "java oracle download" will get you there)
2. To prevent junkware prompts during the updates, disable Java Sponsors.
A java.com FAQ claims that in 7u65 or later, you can find a "Suppress sponsor offers when updating Java" option in the Java Control Panel's Advanced tab, but I have never seen it there, possibly because I have issued the regkey fix. To do that, save the following text to a file titled "disable-java-sponsers.reg" and double-click the file:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\JavaSoft]
"SPONSORS"="DISABLE"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\JavaSoft]
"SPONSORS"="DISABLE"
The answer of "Don't install Java at all, problem solved" is great and I wholeheartedly recommend it for those who don't need to run it, but there are many who have no choice and must run it for work, banking, Minecraft, etc. Using the regkey fix is great to prevent clueless family (grandparents!) and friends who need to run Java from accidentally installing the junkware.
This is a donation driven project written by a single developer. Why would he do this? What benefits would come from collecting personal information and hiding it from users?
Palant claims that Adblock is covertly scaling up into something similar to what Adblock Plus has done.
Anyway, I'm not sure these browser extensions are sufficiently complex and hard to maintain that they can't like Adblock Edge be run by volunteers. If anything it's the filter list maintainers who should get our donations. The big adblockers only have scope to "turn evil" to the extent that people don't switch.
The TSA has been around for a while, too. People don't seem to care about privacy, fundamental liberties, or software freedom. Does that make those things bad or unimportant? No. It just means that people are ignorant.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
It never ceases to amaze me how, even after the Snowden leaks (which revealed the obvious, but in greater detail), people still don't understand the importance of FOSS. If anyone's question is, "What does that have to do with intercepting communications?", you're simply ignorant of the fact that exploits can more easily be hidden in proprietary code, and you are beholden to a specific source to modify the code.
Why use Adblock when a hosts file works across the whole system? Honestly, never understood Adblock.
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
Seems to work the fine for me. As has been said, the host file modification from the winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.htm site blocks 99% of ads as far as I can tell. Privacy badger is a nice little extension that checks for browser tracking.
Sounds very interesting, except for a few details of my own following-up. Here's the hosts file, from the parent thread that I originally replied to. When I follow and download your stuff, I end up with a .exe executable file, which seems like kind of an untrustworthy hassle to deal with, just to extract a simple hosts file, as I'm (mostly) on Linux (etc). At which point I ran out of time and interest.
I'm sorry, but I am really only interested in seeing hosts file code I can read and install myself. But perhaps I am missing something which you might care to clarify? Please forgive me if this is the case, and feel free to do so.
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
for slashdot. all the other sites I use aren't fucking obnoxious with their ads.
Due to the questionable new owners of ABP, I've since changed to Edge.
Basically, the moment people tell you that there's such a thing as "acceptable advertisement" and that anyone except you, yourself can decide which it is, you know they've sold out. It's shorthand for "we will allow advertisement that pays us to let it through".
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT!
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Well, I looked specifically for that once on the page you cited and couldn't find it, before I downloaded the .exe and inspected that. Really, truly. Why don't you save us all time and post the link here? Citations are kind of a standard, as is sarcasm on the Slashdots, but never you mind.
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
That link you cited this time is so much better! Thank you very much; and at first glance your hosts file looks splendid. Thank you for taking the time to clarify yourself AC.
Testing that file is now on my to-do list.
You can't be ahead of the curve, if you're stuck in a loop.
Are you aware of Cyanogen? Did you know that you can buy high end phones with Cyanogen as the default OS? Cyanogen is built from AOSP and is fully free. It also supports extensive ad-blocking and app permission control, way beyond what any other mobile OS offers.
In what way exactly is Android not free? You can build and run it perfectly well without the Google apps, as Cyanogen and many others do. The resulting OS is fully featured and compatible, and can be distributed commercial without permission from Google.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Regarding AdBlock & Wladimir Palant its creator: He wrote me by email, 1st mind you, stating "hosts are a shitty solution" to which I replied this:
"Show us that adblock can do more for added speed, security, reliability, & anonymity than hosts files can, + that adblock does it more efficiently than hosts do"
Which on my latter 'point-in-challenge' on efficiency he was proven in research by others to be MASSIVELY inefficient -> https://blog.mozilla.org/nneth... & Palant can't show adblock does more (especially crippled by default as it is, 'souled-out' to GOOGLE no less).
Additionally - I sent Wladimir Palant that challenge in response to his statement, & from 2 different email addresses I keep no less!
Result? This:
Still no answer from him to myself in regard to my challenge put to him to this very day MONTHS later (that tell you anything? It did me - he knows his addon is far inferior to hosts and certainly less efficient by far also) - Wladimir Palant RAN like a scared rabbitt...
I only tell it how it is on hosts' superiority vs. AdBlock & any browser addon (or combo of them, from a SINGLE FILE you already natively possess no less - vs. "bolting on" more redundant & inefficient complexity + room for failure/breakdown) - funniest part is, Wladimir Palant (& his running) does as well!
APK
P.S.=> Hosts are a superior solution that even fixes DNS redirect security issues (vs. browser addons & their inefficiencies + messagepassing overheads as well as myriad lack of abilities hosts have from 1 single file that is part of the IP stack itself - faster, more efficient, & less redundant as well, since TCP/IP has 45++ yrs. of refinement & optimization applied to it, & runs in a higher CPU serviced ring of privelege & operations in kernelmode vs. slower usermode layering over browsers slowing them more, & hosts = 1st resolver queried by default by the OS itself as well - MULTIPLE bonuses)... apk
These are showing up more often lately. Does slashdot even use any Bayesian content filtering?
Did you know that you can buy high end phones with Cyanogen as the default OS?
I didn't. Which phones? I've never been able to get a decent experience from cyanogen on a phone (My Nook color and tablet are a different matter) because the lack of the little "optimizations" individual to the phone models usually ends up breaking something like voicemail, battery life, or actually detecting a cell signal.
If someone's putting out an actual CM out of the box, I might want to have a look at it.
Wladimir is taking his thank yous in cash from advertisers wanting in on his whitelist. His idea wasn't original. It just became the most popular version. He's a cunt who has betrayed his users.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
A.) Hosts do more than:
1.) AdBlock ("souled-out" 2 Google/Crippled by default)
2.) Ghostery (Advertiser owned) - "Fox guards henhouse"
3.) Request Policy -> http://yro.slashdot.org/commen...
I read through the thread on RequestPolicy, and you were pretty thick when it came to recognizing some key points:
1) RequestPolicy blocks all external sites by default, which means you don't need a "bad" list that needs to be constantly maintained, so it's actually the simpler and more effective solution.
2) The reason to block YouTube from 3rd party sites is to avoid tracking by Google (they own YouTube). With RequestPolicy, I can still watch YouTube videos and avoid the tracking. But that's just one example. RequestPolicy blocks all such requests, so I don't have to worry about YouTube, Amazon, or any other site that probably isn't in the "bad" list from getting tracking info from 3rd party sites by doing something as simple as embedding a link.
3) You mention speed, but give no hard numbers. If, for example, RequestPolicy does its job in less than 1ms, then it doesn't matter if a hosts file is twice as fast or even ten times as fast, because either way the difference is imperceptible. I don't have any speed problems using RequstPolicy, at all.
I'll throw in another point: RequestPolicy is open source, meaning I don't have to trust a binary from "apk" being run as an admin to manage my hosts file. RequestPolicy is also cross-platform.
You can have the last word, as engaging in discussion with you is pointlessly annoying. I'm just leaving this response so that people who are rational can make an informed judgment.
The OnePlus One is the highest spec one, and insanely cheap too. At the moment it is on limited release though, so might be a few months before you can get one. You can of course buy a Nexus 5 an enjoy full Cyanogen support too.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Had a Nexus 5 for about a week. Couldn't stand it. I'll keep an eye out for the OnePlus One, and keep my old Evo 4G alive until then. Thanks :)
"But that is exactly the point: did they notice? No. Google play services has been around for a couple of years now and for all the "evil" and "stealing of freedom" of proprietary software the end result is nothing"
What does it matter if they noticed? Unless you have some sort of actual point, you can't really accuse me of using straw men.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
False equivalency.
Straw man, right off the bat. I was using his own logic against him (That people don't care, so it doesn't matter.) to show how ridiculous it is. That you have a problem with my example shows, I think, that you agree such logic is ridiculous.
Never once did I say that the TSA and choosing proprietary software are 100% similar. So that's your straw man, not mine. Learn what an analogy actually is and then come back to me.
and overwhelmingly people choose proprietary because that is where the innovation is
People choose proprietary software because our government is bought and paid for by corporations to such a degree that proprietary software is used everywhere in schools with little to no mentions of alternatives, and then classes are created that teach people via rote learning how to use specific proprietary software. What happens? People get used to the proprietary operating systems and software, and free software is therefore at a disadvantage.
The educational system is one place where free software should be mandated, and created, if necessary.
because free software is almost always a poor clone of proprietary software, not ahead of the curve, not innovative, just an also-ran me-too product.
Nonsense.
But even if that were true, free software is about morality. There are many things that would benefit me that would nonetheless be completely immoral, much like some proprietary software. The idea that I can't look at or modify the source code, and I'm beholden to some specific source that may be malicious (i.e. working with the government to violate people's privacy, as Snowden has shown), is immoral.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Also, you're incorrect about the TSA. Most people are either apathetic about it or support *some* security there, even if it violates people's rights and the constitution.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Gabriel from AdBlock here.
Here is our response to Wladimir's post:
http://blog.getadblock.com/201...
Why would you have to use Chrome? There are more than two browsers out there, you know. If you otherwise like Firefox, I would suggest IceWeasel or PaleMoon.