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Privoxy - https://www.privoxy.org/ https://www.privoxy.org/ is a light-weight HTTP and HTTPs proxy that can be used as a network-wide ad blocking service, and i
by joosters 9y ago
Privoxy - https://www.privoxy.org/ https://www.privoxy.org/ is a light-weight HTTP and HTTPs proxy that can be used as a network-wide ad blocking service, and is small and efficient enough to run fine on a Pi (it's available packaged with most linux distributions)
For HTTP requests, you can configure lists of URLs (or URL fragments) to block, allowing for full ad blocking. It can also do tricks like allowing URLs but blocking or discarding their cookies so the sites are usable but can't track you via their cookies.
For HTTPs requests, the proxy can't see the URLs so it can't block based on URL, but it falls back to blocking based on hostname, which is good enough for most situations.
Browser plugins like 'Proxy SwitchyOmega' (Firefox/Chrome) make it easy to switch between using the proxy or not if you really need to skip the blocking.
It's also possible to set up privoxy as a transparent proxy, meaning that everything on your network is forced to use it to communicate with the outside world, so it can work with any device, not just those that have proxy configuration options).
I definitely recommend it, it runs fine on my home network. My TV and PS4 work well with it, for instance. (it's a shame that I have to resort to ad-blocking my television in order to stop it spying on me...)
- jdironman 9y agoWhat about solutions for larger environments such as education / universities with 500+ users?
- AdieuToLogic 9y agoSquid[0] might be a good fit for those types of environments. 0 - http://www.squid-cache.org/ http://www.squid-cache.org/
- ktta 9y agoYou are getting into dangerous territory if you want to MITM so many HTTPS connections. (You can do anything with HTTP you want. Starting with DNS blackholing is best) Note that the software GP linked to doesn't (can't) strip ads off an HTTPS connection[1]. It can only completely block it. So for ads + content from a single origin, you can't do anything. If you really want get into individual HTTPS connections, you'd have to install a root cert into every single once of the computers and MITM them by presenting your cert. This is only done in scenarios where one has to control everything the client machines do. Otherwise you're (much) better off preinstalling uBlock Origin on all the computers. BlueCoat is a company which works in this space[2] (it acquired by Symantec last year). Even then, you risk breaking something sometime[3] [1]: https://www.privoxy.org/faq/misc.html#SSL https://www.privoxy.org/faq/misc.html#SSL [2]: https://www.bluecoat.com/support-services https://www.bluecoat.com/support-services [3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13750379 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13750379