Adblock Plus

I recently started listening to This Week In Tech (TWiT), and Security Now!, both podcasts with Leo Laporte. He is always talking about NoScript, so I decided to check it out again since I find myself tangling with malware more often on the web.

So I google NoScript, and the official site looks to be the top hit. Click the link, and.... I see ads. Wait a minute, I have adblock plus! I poke around, even click on the ads (what new creatures these are!) to see whats going on. I do a little more googling and come across two interesting blog posts:

http://adblockplus.org/blog/attention-noscript-users
http://hackademix.net/2009/05/04/dear-a ... community/

I don't mean to dig up skeletons from a couple of years ago, but I'm curious as to what's going on. Deciding to experiment a little, I disable and then enable ad blocking specifically on the NoScript main page. I don't see a difference in the ads. I had already started looking through the FAQ, and I did a brief search of the forums and didn't come across anything relevant.

I totally get trying to protect your revenue stream, and I'm not being judgmental about what's going on, I just want to know what is going on.

I am currently using "Fanboy's list" as a filter subscription on Ad Block plus. I just updated to FF 4 a few days ago, and Ad Block Plus was updated with it.

So why do I see ads on the NoScript page, even if I use Ad Block Plus to explicitly block all ads on the page?

In an effort to hear both(?) side of the story, I posted this on the NoScript forums too:

http://forums.informaction.com/viewtopi ... 822#p26822

I believe the NoScript developer actively makes it difficult for subscription authors to remove ads from his site (changing site design in an effort to thwart attempts).

What Hubrid said.

@Hubird, @Montza:
No.
I haven't touched the "site design" for almost two years now, and I don't "actively make" anything about it.
Those units probably difficult to remove, but because they're just static images embedded in the page itself, which don't even perform any extra round trip to my own server -- let alone a 3rd party server -- and therefore don't implement any persistent tracking / behavioral stuff.
Of course the DOM being a bit random doesn't help either, but this picture of an evil and obsessive webmaster "actively" watching subscription authors and "changing site design in an effort to thwart attempts" is quite off base.

Anyway I guess it is possible to block ads from Noscript site.
You have two options:
1. in about:config you must delete the "data" from "whitelistschemes", this way you can see the encoded images in "blockable items".
The resulting rule can be something like: *:image/*$domain=noscript.net
Due to the way the site is designed, once you block those images you are left with empty boxes that are just DIVs and they don't collapse because the said above images are set via CSS as background.
2. using Element Hiding Helper you can hide some elements. I would hide the whole left column and the top header. But it is possible to be more selective even if at some point you meet parametric stuff.

Um..... Apparently I got "Stallowned" over on the No Script Forum, so I won't be posting there anymore. This was my intended response to Giorgio Maone's claim that the ads don't track:

I'm not worried about tracking: if they can serve me better ads, so be it, I'd rather not be subject to makeup commercials, viagra ads, and the like. For instance Hulu should take note: people watching Naruto (an anime targeted to teens and young adults, mostly male) probably won't need old age medicine or hair product. 5 hour energy? yeah, I'd say that was relevant.

What I AM worried about is malicious code, and juicy but fake ads that take me to infected pages. "Click here" for a scan of "xyz" is a ludicrous concept, almost 100% indicative of malware, and yet you have at least one ad like that on your main page :-/

Besides which, I almost never click on an ad anyways. If I want to buy something I search for it.

I get this pic when I tried to post:
http://evil.hackademix.net/images/stall ... pg#preview

wtf is that shit?? I don't even know what to think about it!

Yes you do.

allanonmage wrote: I get this pic when I tried to post:
http://evil.hackademix.net/images/stall ... pg#preview

wtf is that shit?? I don't even know what to think about it!

It was an anti-spam response. You included "viagra" in your reply.

@Giorgio
Right, not "actively" but harder for users who doesn't want to see ads.

Resistance is futile. I see them so often that I no longer notice them. Normal NoScript users shouldn't need to go to the home page often anyhow. Just uncheck NoScript Options > Notifications > Display the release notes on updates. Since the ads don't bother me anymore -- and I do like to see the release notes -- I never bothered to uncheck it.

Added to EasyList (https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/rev/d21fbde97bbb) If a website is not actively altered I see no reason why EasyList should not filter out all the adverts.

Much better now. Thanks, Michael.

allanonmage wrote:and.... I see ads. Wait a minute, I have adblock plus! I poke around, even click on the ads (what new creatures these are!) to see whats going on. I do a little more googling and come across two interesting blog posts:

http://adblockplus.org/blog/attention-noscript-users
http://hackademix.net/2009/05/04/dear-a ... community/

As you experienced first hand, those two links and your difficulties with blocking his ads are not a coincidence. Despite Giogio's explanation.

He's done it again.

He's changed the server side randomization script once more.

Now the <div> tag for the ads is a random fake tag name. changes every refresh.

This is pure hypocrisy and bullshit on his part. Careful where you step, it's everywhere.

He makes a tool to remove things from pages users don't want.

Then designs his site to force you to see things you may not want.

Telling you they aren't bad ads, they don't track you.

Who is he to tell anyone their level of criteria for when something should be removed?

His actions, past and present, show his innate lack of character and his extreme selfishness and overwhelming arrogance.

noscript is now removed from my machine and I will NEVER install anything he's involved with ever again.

excuse my while I go take a shower to try and wash away the alloy of filth that his hypocrisy, selfishness and arrogance has melded into, it clings to me still.