- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
You must log in or register to comment.
lmao let’s all thank YouTube for spreading the word about adblockers, best adverisment ever
The problem with YouTube is that even if you manage to block ads, you find most of the videos are ads too.
SponsorBlock is essential now. I switched from iPad to an Android tablet largely so I could use YouTube ReVanced. And on Android TV there’s SmartTube Next.
I get that creators gotta eat, but I pay for YouTube Premium already. If they would stop accepting sponsorships from scam companies I might even stop blocking those.
i always lol about people opposing ad blockers.
oh no! my favorite unethical multinational conglomerate now has a few bucks less!
how can anybody see this as a bad thing? ad blocking is cybersecurity.
Some people only believe what they’re told by an authority, and some people only view massive corporations, politicians, and the church as legitimate authorities. So if a corporation tells them it’s bad, they’ll believe it’s bad.
76 percent of cybersecurity experts use ad blockers.
I’m a bit worried about that other 24%. How expert are they if they don’t recognize the risk?
There’s some inherent risk in the ad blocker as well, though. If it’s an extension, you’re trusting that this thing you installed, that can read and modify every website you visit, isn’t going to do anything sneaky. Yes, maybe it’s open source, but every once in a while something sneaks into open source projects, too. It will get caught, but it could be after the damage is done.
I mean, I use an ad blocker. But I don’t think it’s unreasonable to value security and not use one.
But by that logic, absolutely everything other than standing still in a fethal position in a dark cave is a cyber security risk.
Are you using an extremely solid version of Linux? Wellllll, sometimes bad actors can push bad code to open source projects! It’s a risk!
I mean, it’s true. Network-connected devices are inherently a cyber security risk.
Yes, which is why that can’t be used as an argument against one specific tool.
The benefits massively outweigh the risks when it comes to open source ad blockers (lets be honest, we’re all talking about uBO), but limiting your attack surface is a very widely practiced concept in cubersecurity, and there’s no situation where it is totally without merit.
Not using a browser extension but loading JavaScript isn’t limiting your attack surface
To be fair, I bet some percentage of those that don’t use an ad blocker ARE using something like no script and just don’t need one as a result.
Open source adblockers reduce that risk significantly. Don’t trust closed source blockers.
maybe they don’t enable js at all /s
jk, maybe they value fingerprinting over that? even tor browser doesn’t have one built in.
It’s almost as if companies have gone a bit overboard with advertising. Huh. Didn’t see that coming…
Good. Ad blocking is security and anyone that tells you different both doesn’t care about your computer security, and also wants to sell you something.
That 2/3 to 3/4 of computer programmers, computer security experts and advertisers seems low. I feel like that should be closer to 90%
The rest are designing/coding/testing the ads and work for ad companies.
Or bots
You underestimate laziness
Once I had to use the internet without and ad blocker ( shiver ). It was horrible. I still have nightmares.
Joking aside. I couldn’t believe how crammed full and chaotic sites were without an ad blocker. I have no evidence to support this other than my experience but I think , for me , ad blockers are good for my mental health. Being constantly exposed to all those messages trying to exploit insecurities can’t be good for people.
Anyways ad blockers are the best.
This is a census so people probability answered they use ad blockers on the computer but they didn’t ask about mobile, I assume
Here’s where the report is.
i think adblock use on mobile may be far more limited since google chrome on mobile dosent allow to load extensions on mobile
W
Nice! It only took 25 years.
What I wonder is… how?! A quick search shows that half of people in the USA use Chrome, another 30% Safari, 8% use Edge, and only 5% Firefox. This study was done by Ghostery so perhaps they chose a biased subset of the population? It just seems weird to me to think that more than half of average users use ad-blocking, these days.
According to statistics on my server, it’s 57% Chrome, 14% Safari and 12% Firefox. Also 10% use Linux. I’m not hosting anything tech related though.
Anyways, adblocking is kind of essential. Even the boomers ask what’s wrong when ads start showing. The only people I’ve seen browsing without adblock are Apple users.
iPhone or Mac?
Yes
My mom knows nothing about adblock, and is still blocking ads. You better believe all of the kids having to fix their relative’s computers will set up some free antivirus and ad blocking right away.
Can’t comment on the sample size though, Ghostery might indeed be somehow biased and measure devices where their software is installed vs. total number of internet users or something? But users of ghostery are more likely to be tech savvy, so there’s a higher chance of them having more devices that are equally sanitized.
I’d have to dig through the study and see if the sampling mechanism is made public.
Yes it is available. It in turn points to another site Censuswide, but does say:
The figures are representative of all US adults aged 16+
will set up some free antivirus and ad blocking right away.
Those mfs have got a way to go if they’re setting up free antiviruses. Free anti-virsus will hurt your system probably more on average than actual viruses
Bitdefender Free is great and doesn’t nag users to upgrade.
Just use Windows defender already. It’s been good enough for ages. All the others downplay this to justify their existence.
I have an inherent distrust to all things Microsoft. And their firewall is so terrible that I don’t want to find out they were as negligent when it came to developing their antivirus.
Exactly. If you run windows, the default defender anti virus is just as capable. Don’t use 3rd party anti virus software or use the"free" ones.
Some years ago, the Windows Defender certainly was a joke, but currently is very capable with an detection quote of 100%. A cause that Windows, as the most used OS was always also the most atacked by malware, but the devs of MS at least had made a good job. Windows is certainly an privacy nightmare, at least if used in default settings, but in question of security is currently maybe the best protected with safe boot, a good sandbox system and Defender, and, well, the Firewall is good, but sometimes overreacting with the need to whitelist some downloads and apps. But at all, there isn’t anymor need for 3rd party AVs.
Why are people recommending Microsoft spyware in a privacy thread??
Removed by mod
“Github for lesbians” sounds like something I could recommend to my friends of that persuasion though.
Surprised the rates of adblocking is so high! I thought it was a little more niche.
Also surprised that the article didn’t mention manifest v3 rolling out later this year to Chrimium-based browsers - which will effectively end adblocking in all browsers except Firefox.
Google isn’t stupid, they know that ad blocking undermines their business. And Google controls Chromium: the backbone of almost all browsers. So of course they’re going to engineer it to prevent ad blocking. It was only a matter of time.
I’m doubtful of this article claims. Majority of them use adblocker? I’m sure its inaccurate. Most of the people I have seen don’t even know about adblocker. So google doesn’t have to worry for a long time. This article seems like bootlicking Google.
Good, your attention is a commodity, don’t let advertisers steal it. We’ve been assaulted with enough ads in public spaces already.
It is literally wasting the most valuable thing we have, our lifetime.
I wonder if the statistic includes mobile users, because mobile ad blockers are definitely less popular than browser addons on desktop.
note: this isn’t an invitation to tell me about all the wonderful mobile ad blocking solutions, I’m already aware of virtually all of them.
