{"id":75292,"date":"2021-02-07T11:30:49","date_gmt":"2021-02-07T19:30:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.intego.com\/mac-security-blog\/?p=75292"},"modified":"2021-03-03T06:35:22","modified_gmt":"2021-03-03T14:35:22","slug":"ad-blockers-the-good-the-bad-the-ethics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intego.com\/mac-security-blog\/ad-blockers-the-good-the-bad-the-ethics\/","title":{"rendered":"Ad-Blockers: The Good, the Bad, the Ethics"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ad-Blockers<\/p>\n

I think everyone will agree that there are too many ads on the Internet. And since most people ignore ads, online advertising tactics have become increasingly aggressive. They flash, they blink, they auto-play, they pop up, and sometimes ads will\u00a0block web pages until you dismiss them.<\/p>\n

This is, of course, a reaction to the original sin of the Internet: a misguided belief that information wants to be free, and that people wouldn’t pay for online services. Back in the early days, the Internet was new, so free was a way to entice people to use these services. But things are different now, and we’re bombarded with ads.<\/p>\n

Like many people, I use ad blockers to ensure that I can surf the web without being overwhelmed. In this article, I’m going to explain how ad blockers work, why you might want to use them \u2014 for more than just making it easier to read web pages \u2014 how to install them, and I’ll discuss the ethics of using ad blockers.<\/p>\n

How ad-blockers\u00a0work<\/h3>\n

An ad blocker is a simple tool. It generally integrates with your web browser and uses a set of filters to block specific content. As you can see below, in a screenshot from 1Blocker<\/a>, each filter is just a text string; for example, to block an entire website, the string looks like this: ^https?:\/\/+([^:\/]+\\.)?domain\\.com<\/code>. (This probably doesn’t look simple if you’re not familiar with this way of creating search strings…)<\/p>\n

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These filters examine the elements of websites, according to their addresses (URLs), and tell the browser to not load the ones that match their filters. Setting these up manually would be complex for most users, so ad blockers include tens of thousands of such rules and maintain them up-to-date as new ad techniques appear.<\/p>\n

Most ad blockers offer a number of categories that you can activate or deactivate, so the extent of your blocking is up to you.<\/p>\n

Trackers and ad blockers<\/h3>\n

A related element used on websites is trackers<\/em>, and many ad blockers also protect you from them. Trackers send information about you to companies \u2014 website publishers, analytics or advertising companies, among others \u2014 regarding your behavior, the type of computer or mobile device you’re using, and more, to personalize what you see on websites. This may affect the way a website is laid out, but can also be used to send ads to you because of, for example, the previous website you visited. They slow down your web browsing, and invade your privacy.<\/p>\n

Apple’s Safari web browser now includes built-in tracker blocking, a feature the company calls Intelligent Tracking Prevention<\/a>. You can view a privacy report in Safari, showing how many trackers were blocked, and which websites had the most trackers. <\/p>\n

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Pros and cons of ad blockers<\/h3>\n

Ad blockers are all-or-nothing apps. Those filter rules are draconian; they either block or allow. However, most ad blockers allow you to whitelist<\/em> websites; those sites you want to support or that have less obtrusive advertising.<\/p>\n

In some cases, ad blockers will break legitimate websites. So you may need to whitelist them to be able to access them. My bank’s website won’t load correctly if I have my ad blocker on, so I’ve whitelisted it. I’ve also found that Google Drive and Google Docs won’t load if my ad blocker is active, so I’ve whitelisted them too.<\/p>\n

Ad blockers are helpful for a number of reasons. They:<\/p>\n