相关论文: From Blocking to Breaking: Evaluating the Impact o…

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…

A core problem in the development and maintenance of crowd-sourced filter lists is that their maintainers cannot confidently predict whether (and where) a new filter list rule will break websites. This is a result of enormity of the Web,…

With the evolution of the online advertisement and tracking ecosystem, content-filtering has become the reference tool for improving the security, privacy and browsing experience when surfing the Internet. It is also commonly believed that…

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…

Advertisements generate huge chunks of revenues for websites and online businesses. Ad-blocker and tracker blocking programs have gained momentum in the last few years with massive debates raging on privacy concerns and improving user…

The fast growing ad-blocker usage results in large revenue decrease for ad-supported online websites. Facing this problem, many online publishers choose either to cooperate with ad-blocker software companies to show acceptable ads or to…

Ad blockers allow users to browse websites without viewing ads. Online news providers that rely on advertising revenue tend to perceive users adoption of ad blockers purely as a threat to revenue. Yet, this perception ignores the…

While JavaScript established itself as a cornerstone of the modern web, it also constitutes a major tracking and security vector, thus raising critical privacy and security concerns. In this context, some browser extensions propose to…

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…

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)…

Modern web browsers are incredibly complex, with millions of lines of code and over one thousand JavaScript functions and properties available to website authors. This work investigates how these browser features are used on the modern,…

Websites use third-party ads and tracking services to deliver targeted ads and collect information about users that visit them. These services put users' privacy at risk, and that is why users' demand for blocking these services is growing.…

We investigate adblocking filters and the extent to which websites and advertisers react when their content is impacted by these filters. We collected data daily from the Alexa Top-5000 web sites for 120 days, and from specific sites that…

Modern websites heavily rely on JavaScript (JS) to implement legitimate functionality as well as privacy-invasive advertising and tracking. Browser extensions such as NoScript block any script not loaded by a trusted list of endpoints, thus…

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…

One of the Internet's greatest strengths is the degree to which it facilitates access to any of its resources from users anywhere in the world. However, users in the developing world have complained of websites blocking their countries. We…

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…

Privacy-enhancing blocking tools based on filter-list rules tend to break legitimate functionality. Filter-list maintainers could benefit from automated breakage detection tools that allow them to proactively fix problematic rules before…

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…

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…