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User demand for blocking advertising and tracking online is large and growing. Existing tools, both deployed and described in research, have proven useful, but lack either the completeness or robustness needed for a general solution.…
Millions of web users directly depend on ad and tracker blocking tools to protect their privacy. However, existing ad and tracker blockers fall short because of their reliance on trivially susceptible advertising and tracking content. In…
Adblocking tools like Adblock Plus continue to rise in popularity, potentially threatening the dynamics of advertising revenue streams. In response, a number of publishers have ramped up efforts to develop and deploy mechanisms for…
The rise of ad-blockers is viewed as an economic threat by online publishers, especially those who primarily rely on ad- vertising to support their services. To address this threat, publishers have started retaliating by employing ad-block…
Websites employ third-party ads and tracking services leveraging cookies and JavaScript code, to deliver ads and track users' behavior, causing privacy concerns. To limit online tracking and block advertisements, several ad-blocking (black)…
The intrusiveness and the increasing invasiveness of online advertising have, in the last few years, raised serious concerns regarding user privacy and Web usability. As a reaction to these concerns, we have witnessed the emergence of a…
Many internet ventures rely on advertising for their revenue. However, users feel discontent by the presence of ads on the websites they visit, as the data-size of ads is often comparable to that of the actual content. This has an impact…
As third-party cookie blocking is becoming the norm in browsers, advertisers and trackers have started to use first-party cookies for tracking. We conduct a differential measurement study on 10K websites with third-party cookies allowed and…
Third party advertising and tracking (A&T) are pervasive across the web, yet user exposure varies significantly with browser choice, browsing location, and hosting jurisdiction. We systematically study how these three factors shape tracking…
Numerous surveys have shown that Web users are concerned about the loss of privacy associated with online tracking. Alarmingly, these surveys also reveal that people are also unaware of the amount of data sharing that occurs between ad…
Free content and services on the Web are often supported by ads. However, with the proliferation of intrusive and privacy-invasive ads, a significant proportion of users have started to use ad blockers. As existing ad blockers are radical…
Perceptual ad-blocking is a novel approach that detects online advertisements based on their visual content. Compared to traditional filter lists, the use of perceptual signals is believed to be less prone to an arms race with web…
Retargeting ads are increasingly prevalent on the Internet as their effectiveness has been shown to outperform conventional targeted ads. Retargeting ads are not only based on users' interests, but also on their intents, i.e. commercial…
Third-party services form an integral part of the mobile ecosystem: they allow app developers to add features such as performance analytics and social network integration, and to monetize their apps by enabling user tracking and targeted ad…
On today's Web, users trade access to their private data for content and services. Advertising sustains the business model of many websites and applications. Efficient and successful advertising relies on predicting users' actions and…
Online advertisers and analytics services (or trackers), are constantly tracking users activities as they access web services either through browsers or a mobile apps. Numerous tools such as browser plugins and specialized mobile apps have…
On the modern web, trackers and advertisers frequently construct and monetize users' detailed behavioral profiles without consent. Despite various studies on web tracking mechanisms and advertisements, there has been no rigorous study…
Ad and tracking blocking extensions are popular tools for improving web performance, privacy and aesthetics. Content blocking extensions typically rely on filter lists to decide whether a web request is associated with tracking or…
Today, many web advertising data flows involve passive cross-site tracking of users. Enabling such a mechanism through the usage of third party tracking cookies (3PC) exposes sensitive user data to a large number of parties, with little…
Efforts by online ad publishers to circumvent traditional ad blockers towards regaining fiduciary benefits, have been demonstrably successful. As a result, there have recently emerged a set of adblockers that apply machine learning instead…