Testing the uBlock Origin Ad Blocker

Stephen Rees, 123RF

Clean Slate

Erik Bärwaldt

There is hardly a website out there that doesn't have advertisements and trackers. Some sites are practically flooded with them. Ad blockers like uBlock Origin can be used as effective countermeasures.

The advertisement industry likes to spy on Internet users as much as possible. Partly, this is because the industry wants to deliver the most appealing and successful ads possible. At the same time, collecting data that can then be offered for sale is also a goal. It is becoming increasingly difficult for users to extract themselves from these practices. However, innovative developers are up to the task.

Modern web browsers like Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome/Chromium have a modular design that makes it easier to use extensions for keeping the system secure from a wide range of online dangers. These extensions are also good at creating a bulwark against spy technologies and intrusive advertising.

Along side the increasingly clever advances in spy technologies, there have been correspondingly greater efforts made to immunize browsers from intrusions by traditional means. There are many different extensions to choose from. Favorites among these include the ad and tracking blockers Adblock Plus [1] and Ghostery [2]. Both of these programs are partly based on filter lists that the community and manufacturers maintain and update constantly.

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