iOS 9 Ad Blockers

[TruthWatcher412]

Apple mentioned third party devs being able to create as blockers for safari in iOS 9. Anyone know if any of these are available to use/try yet or will they not be available until iOS 9 is officially released?

 

[batting1000]

Apple mentioned third party devs being able to create as blockers for safari in iOS 9. Anyone know if any of these are available to use/try yet or will they not be available until iOS 9 is officially released?

Nothing official. Gotta wait till iOS 9 is released.

 

[KALLT]

http://murphyapps.co/blog/2015/7/21/teasing-crystal-an-ad-blocker-for-ios-9

If you’re lucky, you might be able to participate in a beta programme. There is a stunning silence on this front so far. An adblocker in the App Store is a gold vein waiting to be found.

 

[superstrikertwo]

https://github.com/krishkumar/BlockParty

Tried this one out works pretty well.

 

[Hatton920]

https://github.com/krishkumar/BlockParty

Tried this one out works pretty well.

How do you install it?

 

[Am3r1ca16]

Wow this is great! I didn't know ios 9 allowed developers to develop ad blocking software!! I want to beta test one!

 

[luke lau]

How do you install it?

You'll need to compile it yourself with Xcode and install it on your device

 

[lemimouth]

Just installed, works great ! Only thing is that space used by ads is not reduced, it just left empty white space.

 

[mkaen]

Just installed, works great ! Only thing is that space used by ads is not reduced, it just left empty white space.

That's because the one linked there is very rudimentary. It's simply a list of ad servers that are blocked. It doesn't do any element hiding or anything else.

So a page will say "here's a space for an ad, let's load it from adhost.net". The only thing block party does (currently) is say "oh, I see adhost.net in my list!" and blocks the request. It doesn't hide the space created for the ad.

 

[mkaen]

Note that if you want to do system-wide ad/tracker blocking (any iOS version), you can use a Proxy Auto-Config file (PAC). This works great, but only works on wifi.

 

[gaanee]

Would you share more details on how to use this?

Note that if you want to do system-wide ad/tracker blocking (any iOS version), you can use a Proxy Auto-Config file (PAC). This works great, but only works on wifi.

 

[KALLT]

Would you share more details on how to use this?

There are some apps in de App Store that do something similar. Basically, they use proxy servers and VPNs to connect to these websites and block the connections to third-party servers of advertisers, thus no ads. It’s not exactly a solid way of doing it, because you will pretty much hand over your traffic to a man in the middle.

 

[QuarterSwede]

http://murphyapps.co/blog/2015/7/21/teasing-crystal-an-ad-blocker-for-ios-9

If you’re lucky, you might be able to participate in a beta programme. There is a stunning silence on this front so far. An adblocker in the App Store is a gold vein waiting to be found.

I'd just be happy with trackers being blocked. They do far more to slow down site loading than ads do at this point. Just use Ghostery once on a tracker heavy site (ex. TheVerge.com) to see the difference. It's appalling.

 

[mkaen]

It’s not exactly a solid way of doing it, because you will pretty much hand over your traffic to a man in the middle.

This is not true for what I was referring to (PAC). Traffic that is blocked never leaves your phone, and traffic that isn't blocked goes direct without overhead. There is no "man in the middle" required.

 

[mkaen]

Would you share more details on how to use this?

1. Download this PAC file.
2. Rename the file extension to .js
3. Edit it as follows:
   1. Define the 'blackhole' proxy like this: var blackhole = "PROXY 0.0.0.0:8021"; //iOS loopback
   2. Delete the if(typeof(navigator) [...] block.
4. Save your edited .js file to dropbox.
5. Create a dropbox link to the file.
6. Edit the dropbox link so that it points DIRECTLY to the file by changing the prefix to "dl.dropboxusercontent.com/[...]". Follow the link to test that it loads the raw .js file directly.
7. Go to settings > wifi > "i" for connection info. Scroll to bottom and paste your link from above into the “Auto” HTTP proxy setting.
   1. Note you'll need to do this for each wifi connection you use, the first time you use it.
8. Hit back and turn wifi off/on to load (or reload) the file.

Some people may point you to this post: #6 However, it is a *bad idea* to load someone else's PAC file from a server you don't control. That's because they could at any time change the file to point your traffic wherever, without you knowing. By using your own file, you KNOW that there is not any funny business going on with your traffic.

 

[gaanee]

Thanks mkaen for the explanation and detailed instructions.

1. Download this PAC file.
2. Rename the file extension to .js
3. Edit it as follows:
   1. Define the 'blackhole' proxy like this: var blackhole = "PROXY 0.0.0.0:8021"; //iOS loopback
   2. Delete the if(typeof(navigator) [...] block.
4. Save your edited .js file to dropbox.
5. Create a dropbox link to the file.
6. Edit the dropbox link so that it points DIRECTLY to the file by changing the prefix to "dl.dropboxusercontent.com/[...]". Follow the link to test that it loads the raw .js file directly.
7. Go to settings > wifi > "i" for connection info. Scroll to bottom and paste your link from above into the “Auto” HTTP proxy setting.
   1. Note you'll need to do this for each wifi connection you use, the first time you use it.
8. Hit back and turn wifi off/on to load (or reload) the file.

Some people may point you to this post: #6 However, it is a *bad idea* to load someone else's PAC file you don't own, from a server you don't control. That's because they could at any time change the file to point your traffic wherever, without you knowing. By using your own file, you KNOW that there is not any funny business going on with your traffic.

 

[lemimouth]

Doesn't this slow down the connection, if each query pass through the dropbox file ?

 

[Narcaz]

https://github.com/krishkumar/BlockParty

Tried this one out works pretty well.

How do you install it?

My post from a previous thread. It should still work, but i couldn't test xcode 7 beta 5 so far.:

One of the new features of the latest XCode beta is that anyone can now load apps onto their device without having to be a member of the developer program. So you can "sideload" an open source content blocker for free.

Download the latest xcode beta https://developer.apple.com/xcode/downloads/, an open source blocker like https://github.com/krishkumar/BlockParty and "sideload" the app with your own apple id (tutorial: http://bouk.co/blog/sideload-iphone/). When you hit the play button you will get an error message. You have to replace three bundle identifier lines with your own bundle identifier entry (easy via find in project and replace). After the installation, go to Settings/Safari General and enable Content Blockers. Don't expect too much, this Blocker is under development, but so far it works ok.

 

[KALLT]

For those interested:

• AdBlock: “There will be an AdBlock for Safari 9 and iOS ready when those are released.”
• Adguard: “[W]ith the release of a new Safari version, we will be able to transfer most of the functions of our browser extension on a new track. Unfortunately, some functions will be lost, so that the filtering quality will be slightly lower.” They are positive and somewhat excited for the changes, so they will probably follow soon as well.
• Adblock Plus: They seem rather reserved at this point, but they did announce an iOS app which is due to be unveiled in the next couple of weeks. However, if I understood that correctly, they are going to release a browser instead of a content blocker extension, so that would not be the same.
• uBlock: There is no clear answer I can distill from the Github repos. I understand that uBlock is not that actively under development anymore and the requirement for a paid developer licence seems to be a barrier to this open-source project, so it seems unlikely to get a timely release for Safari. uBlock Origin (the fork that seems to gain much more momentum than uBlock proper) is not going to support Safari anymore. On the plus side, the app Purify I mentioned above seems to start with the source code of uBlock.

I have high hopes for Crystal and Purify. Until that time you can compile your own blocker or use the mechanism suggested above.

 

[Warbrain]

That's because the one linked there is very rudimentary. It's simply a list of ad servers that are blocked. It doesn't do any element hiding or anything else.

So a page will say "here's a space for an ad, let's load it from adhost.net". The only thing block party does (currently) is say "oh, I see adhost.net in my list!" and blocks the request. It doesn't hide the space created for the ad.

While it doesn't do that, it's still nice that it does.

 

[Hatton920]

My post from a previous thread. It should still work, but i couldn't test xcode 7 beta 5 so far.:

I can't use Xcode as I'm running Windows.

 

[Menel]

Note that if you want to do system-wide ad/tracker blocking (any iOS version), you can use a Proxy Auto-Config file (PAC). This works great, but only works on wifi.

Defeats part of the purpose of saving cellular data :/

 

[gaanee]

Does PAC also block in-app ads and tracking or just the web- safari/chrome?

Note that if you want to do system-wide ad/tracker blocking (any iOS version), you can use a Proxy Auto-Config file (PAC). This works great, but only works on wifi.

Note that if you want to do system-wide ad/tracker blocking (any iOS version), you can use a Proxy Auto-Config file (PAC). This works great, but only works on wifi.

 

[thekayman]

Does PAC also block in-app ads and tracking or just the web- safari/chrome?

both

(tx for the tip mkaen this works great)

 

[gaanee]

Does using PAC slow down browsing?
And how does it block in-app ads, since apps display ads even when not connected to wi-fi. So does it help to block in-app ads?

both

(tx for the tip mkaen this works great)