Researchers create vastly improved ad blocker through ‘visual techniques’

A group of scientists has found a new way to block ads on websites. This should allow ads to be blocked much more specifically, and anti-adblock scripts should also be bypassed.

According to the researchers, it is the most powerful form of adblocking developed to date, Motherboard reports. Tests would show that the ad blocker requires little processing power, but is able to block ads that other ad blockers show. The researchers tested their method on fifty websites where traditional ad blockers failed to remove the advertising: in all fifty cases the new software succeeded in keeping the websites free of advertisements.

The method works because it uses so-called visual techniques, something the researchers call perceptual ad blocking. For example, the system uses information such as the size of the ad unit, the use of certain keywords, such as ‘sponsored’ or ‘ad’, or the use of images that match what has been seen in other advertisements. The techniques used are therefore comparable to how people identify advertisements themselves, according to the researchers. Conventional ad blockers actually use code to detect ads.

Although there has been a cat-and-mouse game between advertisers and ad blockers for years, the researchers believe their method will prove unavoidable. This is because advertisements must meet certain legal requirements so that they are recognized by readers. This means that the adblocker always has an advantage, as long as this legislation exists, according to the scientists.

A draft version of the adblocker has now been developed, and it is available as a plug-in for Chrome. However, this does not yet make it possible to actually block advertisements; the software only highlights the ads, but does not remove them. It will probably be possible to remove the advertising with a new version.