49

Upon visiting a site today I was rewarded with Comic Sans.

Behold it's glory:

enter image description here Source

Needless to say I can finally understand why so many people loathe this font.

However, this does bring up a question.

Will websites ever become smart enough to simply stop displaying content to AdBlock users altogether? If so, then what can be done about it?

I understand that this is probably just some small JS checker embedded in the HTML so AdBlock cannot block the detection of it's own anti-ad antics but I found this "reward" to be quite funny.

Dave
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MonkeyZeus
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  • heh, thats an interesting response to adblocking. No, it would not be easy to prevent client side scripts from detecting Adblock, as it removes elements from the DOM, which the scripts can evaluate, to determine if you have loaded the ad panels or not. Websites are already "smart enough" to provide bogus output if they like, unless you disable client side scripting like javascript. NoScript, Ghostery, and RequestPolicy are just a few examples of how you might be more selective in the scripts that run, but then the provider willj just bundle them with required functionality so you need them. – Frank Thomas Sep 02 '15 at 17:03
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    Are you using AdBlock or AdBlock Plus? I'm using the latter and don't get any warning nor ugly font when visiting the link you provided. – FastEthernet Sep 02 '15 at 17:06
  • What does a question about `Comic Sans` have to do with AdBlock? – Ramhound Sep 02 '15 at 17:48
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    @Ramhound, from the banner, the site operators are applying a ComicSans font to any render where an adblocker is in play. – Frank Thomas Sep 02 '15 at 18:46
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    They are not catching use of [uBlock Origin](https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock) "" either ;) – DavidPostill Sep 02 '15 at 20:52
  • What browser and ad-blocking extension are you using? On Firefox with uBlock Origin and Fanboy Ultimate List, the ad blocking is not detected by the website. – galacticninja Sep 03 '15 at 15:50
  • @galacticninja Web browser is defined in the tags of the question. [AdBlock v2.39](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/adblock/gighmmpiobklfepjocnamgkkbiglidom?hl=en) – MonkeyZeus Sep 03 '15 at 16:02
  • @MonkeyZeus Try uBlock Origin instead of AdBlock. – galacticninja Sep 03 '15 at 16:15
  • What did you try to resolve the issue? Did uBlock Origin or AdBlock Plus work? – galacticninja Sep 05 '15 at 04:00
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    BTW, you can force a font in firefox. I don't know for other browsers. –  Nov 26 '15 at 12:03
  • Much rather look at Comic Sans than ads. Honestly, it doesn't look that bad. I mean.. it could be way way worse with like WingDings or some such. – Enigma Sep 30 '16 at 15:38
  • If you disable javascript for the site you will not get ads or adblock detection. Most blogs and news sites will work fine, but it may interfere with other sites. On the other hand, sites that disabling javascript interferes with usually don't care if you use adblockers because they are marketing something actually useful and don't need to use ads to beg for clickbait revenue. – mopsyd Apr 12 '19 at 20:51

5 Answers5

20

Change your ad blocking extension to uBlock Origin (Chrome version / Firefox version). The page appears normally and without ads in uBlock Origin in both Firefox and Chrome.

In settings » Filter Lists, enable all the filters in the Built-in, Ads, Privacy, Malware Domains, and Multipurpose sections.

galacticninja
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    There is also an optional anti-adblock killer from Reek. I recommend this as well. – Brendonwbrown Nov 24 '15 at 13:58
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    uBlock can be also detected for example on this site: http://www.mindgames.com/game/Rapid+Math – fodma1 Jan 18 '16 at 19:12
  • @fodma1 Looks like a filter list issue. Try reporting it to the EasyList maintainers: https://forums.lanik.us/index.php – galacticninja Jan 18 '16 at 20:51
  • Also available for Safari: https://safari-extensions.apple.com/details/?id=com.el1t.uBlock-3NU33NW2M3 Repo: https://github.com/el1t/uBlock-Safari#ublock-originfor-safari – iled Jul 25 '18 at 15:43
  • Would like to add here that Anti-Adblock Killer by reek has been abandoned and discontinued since November 2016. It has been superseded by Nano Defender. – galacticninja Mar 30 '19 at 13:27
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I've been able to successfully stop detection of AdBlock on various sites by following their instructions to enable content when AdBlock is detected. The instructions basically require you to add the AakList (Anti-AdBlock Killer filter list) to the AdBlock filter lists, and also create a custom filter for the sites that are blocking content because of AdBlock. The filter's format is @@||example.com$elemhide (instructions tested & correct as of the November 2015 version)

EDIT AakList has added simpler instructions to add their list for most modern browsers, follow this link, click on "Subscribe", and that's it (I tested on Firefox)

Hamman Samuel
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    elemhide worked! that list is actually [here](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/reek/anti-adblock-killer/master/anti-adblock-killer-filters.txt) – Aquarius Power Aug 21 '16 at 04:11
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    Would like to add here that the Anti-Adblock Killer (AAK) by reek has been abandoned and discontinued since November 2016. It has been superseded by Nano Defender. – galacticninja Mar 30 '19 at 13:28
7

You can add an adblock detection removal list where you add your other filters.

  1. Go to your ad blocker's settings.
  2. If available just activate an adblock warning removal filter.
  3. If there's no such filter available, go to custom or my filters, and add one of the ad block warning filter URLs. See below.

Ad Block warning filters

uBlock

AdBlock Plus in Chrome

AdBlock Plus in Chrome

Ooker
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orkoden
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  • Anti-Adblock Killer (AAK) by reek has been abandoned and discontinued since November 2016. It has been superseded by Nano Defender. – galacticninja Mar 30 '19 at 13:28
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Download ghostery extensions/addon depeding on your browser. Then restrict the site from seeing information about you. The site will work after.

rrg
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    @fixer1234 After seeing your comment, I did a lot of digging. I was previously under the impression that Better Advertising, the company that bought the Ghostery extension (they have since changed their name first to Evidon and then Ghostery), had another product that was actually adware (the unwanted program kind that produces extra pop-ups, etc.). However, I was unable to uncover anything about the other product that I remembered. I have nothing in particular against GhostRank - I use Adblock Plus myself (though with Acceptable Ads disabled). Thanks for your comment, I deleted my original. – puzzlepiece87 Sep 30 '16 at 00:27
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Not sure if this will help anyone but I needed Fanboy's Annoyance List to block ads on Seattle times. Here is my full list of adblock filters. These filters can be found here.

https://easylist.to/

cokedude
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