[Rabbit-dev] ad blocking

[Rick Leir]

On 16/12/2010 6:00 AM, rabbit-dev-request at khelekore.org wrote:
> OpenDNS is a fine service but as stated in my previous posting I don't think that DNS is the optimum way to block sites.
> Besides this does nothing for Ads.  The problem with DNS lookup approach is that it takes longer, wastes resources, and
> neither AdFilter or BlockFilter are called.
The best way to block ads is at the client: use the NoScript add-on with 
FireFox. You as a service provider will encounter users who *do* want to 
see ads; what do you say to them? Unfortunately some users will find 
NoScript hard to use; there are simpler ad blocker FF add-ons. The 
destination page (say cnn.com or abc.com) loads slightly faster than 
normal because fewer scripts are executing. The areas where ads would 
appear are blank, and if you want to open the NoScript menu then you can 
enable scripts that will load ads.
> A better approach would be to add code the filtering code to
> 1. check for local file based tables of ad/malware
> or
> 2. use db based tables
> or
> 3. have the filters do blackhole dns lookups in the filters looking for positive hits.
>
> 3 differs than just using OpenDNS because the lookup happens in the Filter code and not in the general url processing
> code.  So... if you point the AdFilter code to a ad based blackhole DNS then you can do the NoAd.gif processing.
> Similarly if the DNS is a malware blackhole then you do the lookup in BlockFilter and take appropriate action there.
>
> Using OpenDNS the way you currently do you get an invalid DNS lookup and a timeout with less control on how the
> processing takes place.
I use OpenDNS more for malware blocking than ad blocking. It is very 
good at shielding you from the dark side of the net. No timeouts, you 
see a PPC page hosted at OpenDNS.
cheers -- Rick