12 ms·

A Popular Ad Blocker Also Helps the Ad Industry

129 points by bpierre 13y ago

ck2 13y ago
As I understand it, if you turn off "ghostrank" it's not reporting anything? If that is not true, I definitely would like to know. The only behavior I've seen that I don't like is after you update the blocklists, sometimes they are not all activated by default. The current author is around here too, they have replied to my previous posts about it.
- asperous 13y ago
  From the article > “Anything that gives people more transparency and control is good for the industry,” says Meyer, who says it’s fine with him that most Ghostery users opt not to share data with Evidon. Meyer points out that those who want to block online advertising are unlikely to respond to it, making Ghostery use good for both sides.
ck2 13y ago
BTW, user ghostwords participates here and is a coder for Ghostery https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=ghostwords https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=ghostwords
- rcfox 13y ago
  In general, I'd suggest you don't "out" people. First, they might not want to be thrust into the spotlight. Second, it doesn't really add anything to the conversation when you do it like this. I don't think there's any harm done here though, since they have mentioned it themselves in comments.
  - ck2 13y ago
    Oh I'd never do it unless they volunteered that info themselves. They seemed to use that account for outreach so I figured they might show up again.
- ghostwords 13y ago
  Oh wow, step away from the Internet for an evening and this happens. Yes, I am a Ghostery developer. Here is what Ghostery has to say about this non-story: http://purplebox.ghostery.com/?p=1016023438 http://purplebox.ghostery.com/?p=1016023438 Regarding Disconnect's openness, take a look at https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firefox/content/services-firefox.js https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firef... That's Disconnect's master tracking list. I'd say it bears an uncanny resemblance to Ghostery's tracker library, but then I'd be breaking all sorts laws tampering with encryption.[1] Please feel free to browse Ghostery's source code. All our extensions[2] are zips of unobfuscated JavaScript. -- [1] Nice take on the old "disable right-clicking on images". Not so nice to take tracker definitions from competitors and then brag about having the biggest library. [2] IE is a bit special, as always, but that's out of our control for now (http://crossrider.com http://crossrider.com).
hayksaakian 13y ago
So they found a way to monetize not having ads. What's wrong with that? It's also opt-in as the article notes.
- byoogle 13y ago
  Opt in for what? They say to "share" your data with Ghostery, but what they do is sell your data to advertisers. Shouldn't an anti-tracking solution be more transparent than the problem?
  - fixanoid 13y ago
    Brian, I understand that its beneficial to you as a competitor to Ghostery to bash Ghostery at this point, but please, refrain from looking stupid. Ghostery collects tracker information and not individual users info. Ghostery requires an opt-in before any data is shared. Anyone wishing to dig deeper should read the source code since its not obfuscated unlike some of your disconnect's open sourced code. If you do however have ideas on how we should be more transparent, by all means, please share them.
    - Revisor 13y ago
      Out of curiosity what part of the Disconnect's source code is obfuscated?
      - thirsteh 13y ago
        https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firefox/content/services-firefox.js https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firef...
meritt 13y ago
Ad blocking is already beneficial for the ad industry. The sort of people who install ad blocking are also the type who never interact with ads. The net result is an improved CTR/CPA because ad impressions are not being wasted on someone who would not convert in the first place.
- chrisballinger 13y ago
  You just totally blew my mind. I had never considered that blocking ads could ever be beneficial for an ad network. Are there any numbers of this sort published by the industry?
  - s3r3nity 13y ago
    No of course not -- it's mostly specious reasoning that's not really backed by data EDIT: probably sarcasm, but still will leave this here
- citricsquid 13y ago
  This makes the deeply flawed assumption that the only time advertisements have value is if someone clicks them.
  - meritt 13y ago
    Brand awareness campaigns and media buys would be the sort of exception you're talking about and you're absolutely right. Or if you're a company who buys a ton of fraudulent traffic in order to inflate your Alexa/Quantcast/Hitwise/etc rankings, then every impression counts as well. However, if the advertiser is like the bulk of online advertising (e.g. one of the many for-profit online-degree-mills or someone pushing the latest weight loss pills) they tend to very aggressively optimize towards a desired CPA and eliminating non-converting traffic is always the goal. A better CVR creates happier advertisers which leads to higher bids & budgets and then higher publisher payouts.
  - dredmorbius 13y ago
    It's possible for advertising to have negative value. There are brands / stores / products I've avoided specifically because of the advertising, whether it was annoying, disgusting, insulting, belittling, bigoted, or whatever. I've got several examples in mind as I speak.
meritt 13y ago
Fun little discussion from 3 years ago: http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?p=9518885&sid=f1e3da37067a5f129ee39edb5110afbe#p9518885 http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?p=9518885&sid=f1... > I am the developer of Firefox Ghostery > I can assure you that the only way our company gets any information from you is if you opt-in > I can also assure you that none of the data we have is ever going to be sold to anybody.
- tdrgabi 13y ago
  In the article, it says it's opt-in. The quotes you added say they get info only if you opt-in. I see nothing wrong with the quotes.
  - meritt 13y ago
    > I can also assure you that none of the data we have is ever going to be sold to anybody [2010] > Evidon sells two main services based on the data it collects [2013]
    - JimJames 13y ago
      This doesn't look good for ghostery but hypothetically both of these statements can be true. They may be referring to the idea that they don't sell an individuals data, only massed results, so no one can be singled out. This is how census data is used, the data itself is never sold but companies can ask for certain queries to be done on the data which are then performed by the census bureau and returned to the client.
      - fixanoid 13y ago
        Precisely. GhostRank collects and repackages tracker information on the web, not individual browsing habits.
    - Robin_Message 13y ago
      Companies don't keep promises. No company that buys another is going to be bound by something some developer said three years prior. I wonder if small startups doing popular things for geeks are heading towards a similar backlash against "selling out" that the alternative music scene had in the 80's and 90's.
nikcub 13y ago
the opt-in could be more transparent. I just installed Ghostery and the option says[1]: > Help Support Ghostery by sending anonymous statistical data back to Ghostery HQ. It is only when you click more information that you find out this information can be sent to other companies "Ghostery community..", and then only when you click on the FAQ and read the section about Ghostrank is it clearer how this information is being shared [2] and with whom. No mention of ad networks as clients. No mention of helping ad networks better target ads, infact their FAQ explicitly states: > Evidon doesn’t work to allow advertisers to be more invasive. Ghostery market to the privacy community. Their Twitter account[3] has been on top of the recent NSA story and other privacy stories and they promote their product as a solution for the privacy conscious. The way they have co-opted the community, funneling new users into their product via user ad tracking fears, while at the same time selling the data via a vague opt-in feels disingenuous to me. I think the 'fix' here could be as simple as acknowledging third-party sharing in that initial opt-in screen, and then updating the language in the FAQ to include clarification on how it is shared. [1] screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/xuRdj http://imgur.com/a/xuRdj [2] FAQ: http://www.ghostery.com/faq#q14 http://www.ghostery.com/faq#q14 [3] https://twitter.com/ghostery https://twitter.com/ghostery
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  I don't remember where I read about it, but I've known about it for a while. I was never particularly upset- I understood it to be aiding ad networks in targeting, which I think is a good thing. You seem to think this line implies they are not improving targeting: > Evidon doesn’t work to allow advertisers to be more invasive. But this says to me they don't help advertisers shoehorn ads in more places, not anything about targeting.
  - nikcub 13y ago
    I'm indifferent to it, I knew they were collecting data, I didn't know where it was going from there. I have never used or recommended Ghostery because I don't believe blacklisting tracking targets is the solution. The 'more invasive' line isn't clear - it isn't a term that you find in other privacy policies. It would be difficult to be 'more invasive' than tracking with third-parties on the web the way it is today. I think they may be forced into expanding and clarifying that line and parts of the FAQ is this becomes a popular issue. I read that entire section and can't figure out what they do or don't do ..
artichokeheart 13y ago
Time for an open source alternative
- byoogle 13y ago
  Done :-): https://disconnect.me/ https://disconnect.me/ https://github.com/disconnectme https://github.com/disconnectme
Amadou 13y ago
I'm not too surprised to read this story. Ghostery seems to have redone their UI recently and it looks like one of those form-over-function redesigns that happen when a company comes into some money, decides to spend it on looking pretty but forgets to spend any of it on usability analysis. Since it sounds like their revenue does not come from the users, making it look pretty but less useful doesn't really hurt them as long as there are no competitors. In case anyone cares, when I say less useful I mean that the new layout makes it harder to individually enable/disable specific trackers in the cases where a tracker provides functionality necessary for the website to operate. The new layout is much more mouse intensive for anything but the trivial case of minimal trackers on a page. It's unwieldy to selectively enable trackers on sites with more than roughly 5 trackers on them because of the manual scolling-in-a-tiny-window layout and difficulty reading the list of trackers due to drawing lines through the text of their names.
- fixanoid 13y ago
  Hi Amadou, you should really post on our support board to get understanding or where Ghostery UI is going.
guelo 13y ago
NoScript doesn't mess around, it is hardcore and paranoid. I run it with the non-recommended "Temporarily allow top-level sites by default"/"Base 2nd level Domains" option in order to ease the pain a little bit. Still, sometimes I can't figure out how to watch a video, or leave a comment, or some other interaction. But I will suffer the pain, for the web is a brutal, unforgiving no-man's land. I think NoScript has saved me from some spear-phishing attacks. I hope. You just can't let strangers run code on your machine, no matter the sandbox. It's the reality that we live in.
- qwerta 13y ago
  Also noscript user. In my case I just disabled JS in Chrome and blocked a few sites in /etc/hosts.
  - chalst 13y ago
    Dan Pollock's list of abusive IP addresses is useful for this (updated a bit more often than weekly): http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/ http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/
- WickyNilliams 13y ago
  It's a damn shame that it's not available for Chrome. There are various rip offs, with confusingly similar names, but the real deal is not available. Last I checked Chrome doesn't have sufficient hooks to block scripts early enough
mp3geek 13y ago
With the merger of Easylist and Fanboy's Adblock Plus List, using various combinations of subscriptions (adblock/privacy/social/annoyance) can make the need for something like Ghostery extension a thing of the past. /Fanboy
greyman 13y ago
I installed Ghostery just a few days ago, and it is clearly indicated that it is opt-in. I don't see a problem here, looks to me a bit like an attack against Ghostery. But of course, open-source alternative with the same functionality would be better... I find Ghostery as a good compromise for me; Noscript is too much hassle for a day-to-day use, and I also don't like to use Adblock for "philosophical" reasons. Ghostery does exactly what I think should be done - remove the tracking, since I didn't give permission to anyone to track me.
- byoogle 13y ago
  Isn't there a big difference between asking users to opt in to "share" their data with Ghostery (which is what Ghostery says) and asking users to opt in to have their data (what data, btw?) "sold" to advertisers (which is what Ghostery does)?
byoogle 13y ago
Ghostery claims that 45% of their users (8 million out of 18 million) are opted in to send Ghostery their browsing data. I wonder if even 1% of those users know their data is being sold to advertisers by Ghostery. I have trouble believing the solution to online tracking is even less transparent than the problem. I work on an anti-tracking alternative called Disconnect. We do this crazy thing where we ask our users to pay for our product. Oh, and lots of people also already happen to think Disconnect is better than Ghostery: http://lifehacker.com/the-best-browser-extensions-that-protect-your-privacy-479408034 http://lifehacker.com/the-best-browser-extensions-that-prote.... :-)
- m-r-a-m 13y ago
  I like Disconnect (I only found it a few days ago), but I'm trying to find out more technical information about what it does without having to look through the code on GitHub. Basically, does it provide additional privacy features on top of ABP+Easylist+EasyPrivacy? Also, why is it not listed on the Mozilla add-ons site? I barely found out about it. I think I was researching privacy extensions for Chrome and happened to click through to your website.
  - byoogle 13y ago
    Thanks. Disconnect currently has the biggest list of tracking sites of any app (well over 2,000 sites). And our filtering engine is written differently than other apps (no slow regexes). In practice, we benchmarked the 1,000 most popular sites and found they loaded an average of 27% faster with Disconnect than without. I've also done some informal benchmarks of other apps (I should do a more formal study at some point) and can say Disconnect accelerates pages quite a bit more than them. Mozilla's review process is too sluggish for us right now since we're still making changes to Disconnect 2 quickly. When things are more stable, we'll probably submit to AMO.
    - kamiel 13y ago
      Is there any reason why Disconnect doesn't block Disqus and OpenX?
captn3m0 13y ago
Its weird that nobody mentioned Disconnect[1], which is an open source alternative to Ghostery. I've used it in the past, but shifted back to ghostery because it was buggy. [1]: https://disconnect.me/ https://disconnect.me/
- byoogle 13y ago
  I just mentioned Disconnect, but I make Disconnect. :-) You should try the new Disconnect (Disconnect 2) which has a lot more features than Ghostery and is even rated higher by users than Ghostery is. We just launched Safari and Opera versions today (and are also available on Chrome and Firefox).
  - rs232 13y ago
    Any plans to accept Bitcoin donations?
    - byoogle 13y ago
      Yeah, I think later this week. (We actually had a Coinbase implementation before we launched, which we decided to pull last minute because we thought there was a little too much Bitcoin and Coinbase uncertainty at the time.)
  - Semaphor 13y ago
    And thanks for it! It's blocking is great and the interface is by far the most userfriendly of the bunch :) I switched to it when it was mentioned on HN a few months ago.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
  - nly 13y ago
    Please consider accepting payments in Bitcoin! Also, does "Wi-fi security" conflict with HTTPS Everywhere? The features seem to be analogous.
crockstar 13y ago
I use Ghostery to see what is being tracked rather than block it outright. Call me foolish but I never realised that blocking ads was the primary intended purpose of the tool, I've always just used it to check for missing analytics tags and so forth.
zacmartin 13y ago
God forbid advertisers, who fund much of the content we consume online, get better at serving ads that are more relevant to the consumer.
ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
Not that this really does this, but I would be all for a better adblocking tool that did communicate back to whatever adhosting company presented ads on a page. If I opt in to allow my browsing behavior to help improve the sites I visit, I am presented the ads. When I click to disable an ad, I am presented some options: * The content is not relevant to me or the topic * The ad is intrusive or hurts my experience on the site Then let me decide to block all ads on the site, just this ad, or these types (e.g. popovers) on the site. The data can then be relayed back (again, I opted in) to the ad company and the site's owners and they might even be allowed to see browsing behavior that shows how much time you spend on the site. It could be a clear message to advertisers and content providers about the amount of revenue they are missing out on and why.
eliasmacpherson 13y ago
I guess now I see why people say "You misspelled ad block plus" when someone recommends ghostery.
Nux 13y ago
People might also be interested in the Request Policy addon, it acts by blocking all content that does not come from the site you are visiting. https://www.requestpolicy.com/ https://www.requestpolicy.com/
wheaties 13y ago
Can someone tldr this article? I tried to read it on my phone but the "view this on mobile" not only blocked all content but had an unreachable close button
cletus 13y ago
This thread like a lot of topics in this space is full of misinformation so let me dispel some common myths: 1. "I never click on ads" Irrelevant and, more often than not, a lie. But let's assume it's the truth. Search advertising is an example of intent-based advertising. It's why it works so well. If you're searching for camera then a site that sells cameras (via an ad in the search results) is likely relevant. Display advertising (which encompasses things like ads on the NY Times etc) on the other hand is not there specifically to drive a particular action. Brand awareness is a common use case. Search advertising is sold on a CPC basis because it is intent based. Display advertising is by and large sold on a CPM basis. You don't get the impression and the publisher doesn't get paid. Some will label this "theft". Personally I find this like many real world analogies to be inappropriate in the digital world. Pejorative aside, it is taking money from the publisher and users have largely shown an unwillingness to pay for the content they consume directly. 2. "I don't trust [ad company X]" The privacy argument. As this post shows, the temptation to resell your information, particularly by small players, is alluring. Frankly I'm more inclined to trust the Googles of the world than I am some guy who writes an extension. Google, for example, give you several options here. - You can go to the Ads Preference Manager [1] and tailor your privacy settings. - You can simply delete your cookies every hour/day/week/month/whatever. 3. "My ad blocking improves ads" I don't know where this sprang from other than ignorance of advertising is bought and sold. No impression, no revenue. The marginal improvement in eCPC based on not showing you an ad is a) irrelevant because display advertising is often not action-based and b) no increase in revenue since it's a smaller pool of impressions. Just today (still on the front page at the time of this post) is a submission about how people have a warped view of how much time others spend talking or thinking about them [2]. I believe the same distorted view of the world that most of us have also comes into play here. As much hand-wringing as there is about privacy, when it comes to advertising, advertisers don't really care about you, the individual, as much as money seem to think. What advertisers care about is groups of people with a particular profile ("segment"). So I respect the approach of being paranoid (or at least diligent/skeptical) when it comes to online privacy but, as far as advertising goes anyway, it's largely theater. I question the ethics of shifting the cost burden of the Internet onto others (ie tragedy of the commons) just because an image of a pair of shoes offends your delicate sensibilities is an interesting choice. I don't really click on ads either but I don't really care that ads for the Westin follow me around after I've gone to their site either (that's called remarketing or retargeting BTW). Whatever the case I'd rather Google have my browsing history than Ghostery any day of the week. I should note that I strongly believe in blocking obnoxious advertising. This includes, but is not limited to: - popups (actual browser windows or just HTML elements that block content until dismissed) - any video on a Web page that auto-plays - any sound on a Web page that auto-plays - most if not all interstitials - anything Flash based just because I don't want anything Flash based running on my computer It tends to be the sleazier side of the Internet that employ bad advertising practices like this but not entirely. Auto-playing media is particularly bad. Disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer in display advertising. [1]: http://www.google.com/ads/preferences http://www.google.com/ads/preferences [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5895648 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5895648
gyardley 13y ago
Can people really not tell the difference between 'my data is being sold' and 'an aggregate based on my data plus data from a million others is being sold'? A company that only collects data when the user opts-in and sells innocuous products like market-share information and tracking tag audits for individual sites hardly deserves the ire. It's not like it's the federal government.
- Karunamon 13y ago
  Apparently not. All tracking of all kinds even when completely anonymized is evil and bad and you should feel ashamed of yourself for even thinking otherwise /s
pessimizer 13y ago
I'm absolutely shocked that I don't seem to mind this or think that it's wrong. Turns out that my enemy isn't advertisers, it's being tracked all over the internet. I wish there was a way to exclusively allow static, non-tracking ads that just rely on the content of the site to target, rather than the content of my life. It'd be just like magazines in ye olden dayes.
- icesoldier 13y ago
  This is why I added an Adblock exception rule to allow ads from Project Wonderful. From what I can tell, PW's network only "targets" by matching sites to ads by category, which is decided by both the site and the advertiser.
retube 13y ago
won't blocking cookies from third party domains stop tracking? Or at least most of it.

129 points by bpierre 13y ago

ck2 13y ago

As I understand it, if you turn off "ghostrank" it's not reporting anything? If that is not true, I definitely would like to know. The only behavior I've seen that I don't like is after you update the blocklists, sometimes they are not all activated by default. The current author is around here too, they have replied to my previous posts about it.

asperous 13y ago
From the article > “Anything that gives people more transparency and control is good for the industry,” says Meyer, who says it’s fine with him that most Ghostery users opt not to share data with Evidon. Meyer points out that those who want to block online advertising are unlikely to respond to it, making Ghostery use good for both sides.

ck2 13y ago

BTW, user ghostwords participates here and is a coder for Ghostery https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=ghostwords https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=ghostwords

rcfox 13y ago
In general, I'd suggest you don't "out" people. First, they might not want to be thrust into the spotlight. Second, it doesn't really add anything to the conversation when you do it like this. I don't think there's any harm done here though, since they have mentioned it themselves in comments.
- ck2 13y ago
  Oh I'd never do it unless they volunteered that info themselves. They seemed to use that account for outreach so I figured they might show up again.
ghostwords 13y ago
Oh wow, step away from the Internet for an evening and this happens. Yes, I am a Ghostery developer. Here is what Ghostery has to say about this non-story: http://purplebox.ghostery.com/?p=1016023438 http://purplebox.ghostery.com/?p=1016023438 Regarding Disconnect's openness, take a look at https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firefox/content/services-firefox.js https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firef... That's Disconnect's master tracking list. I'd say it bears an uncanny resemblance to Ghostery's tracker library, but then I'd be breaking all sorts laws tampering with encryption.[1] Please feel free to browse Ghostery's source code. All our extensions[2] are zips of unobfuscated JavaScript. -- [1] Nice take on the old "disable right-clicking on images". Not so nice to take tracker definitions from competitors and then brag about having the biggest library. [2] IE is a bit special, as always, but that's out of our control for now (http://crossrider.com http://crossrider.com).

hayksaakian 13y ago

So they found a way to monetize not having ads. What's wrong with that? It's also opt-in as the article notes.

byoogle 13y ago
Opt in for what? They say to "share" your data with Ghostery, but what they do is sell your data to advertisers. Shouldn't an anti-tracking solution be more transparent than the problem?
- fixanoid 13y ago
  Brian, I understand that its beneficial to you as a competitor to Ghostery to bash Ghostery at this point, but please, refrain from looking stupid. Ghostery collects tracker information and not individual users info. Ghostery requires an opt-in before any data is shared. Anyone wishing to dig deeper should read the source code since its not obfuscated unlike some of your disconnect's open sourced code. If you do however have ideas on how we should be more transparent, by all means, please share them.
  - Revisor 13y ago
    Out of curiosity what part of the Disconnect's source code is obfuscated?
    - thirsteh 13y ago
      https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firefox/content/services-firefox.js https://github.com/disconnectme/disconnect/blob/master/firef...

meritt 13y ago

Ad blocking is already beneficial for the ad industry. The sort of people who install ad blocking are also the type who never interact with ads. The net result is an improved CTR/CPA because ad impressions are not being wasted on someone who would not convert in the first place.

chrisballinger 13y ago
You just totally blew my mind. I had never considered that blocking ads could ever be beneficial for an ad network. Are there any numbers of this sort published by the industry?
- s3r3nity 13y ago
  No of course not -- it's mostly specious reasoning that's not really backed by data EDIT: probably sarcasm, but still will leave this here
citricsquid 13y ago
This makes the deeply flawed assumption that the only time advertisements have value is if someone clicks them.
- meritt 13y ago
  Brand awareness campaigns and media buys would be the sort of exception you're talking about and you're absolutely right. Or if you're a company who buys a ton of fraudulent traffic in order to inflate your Alexa/Quantcast/Hitwise/etc rankings, then every impression counts as well. However, if the advertiser is like the bulk of online advertising (e.g. one of the many for-profit online-degree-mills or someone pushing the latest weight loss pills) they tend to very aggressively optimize towards a desired CPA and eliminating non-converting traffic is always the goal. A better CVR creates happier advertisers which leads to higher bids & budgets and then higher publisher payouts.
- dredmorbius 13y ago
  It's possible for advertising to have negative value. There are brands / stores / products I've avoided specifically because of the advertising, whether it was annoying, disgusting, insulting, belittling, bigoted, or whatever. I've got several examples in mind as I speak.

meritt 13y ago

Fun little discussion from 3 years ago: http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?p=9518885&sid=f1e3da37067a5f129ee39edb5110afbe#p9518885 http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?p=9518885&sid=f1... > I am the developer of Firefox Ghostery > I can assure you that the only way our company gets any information from you is if you opt-in > I can also assure you that none of the data we have is ever going to be sold to anybody.

tdrgabi 13y ago
In the article, it says it's opt-in. The quotes you added say they get info only if you opt-in. I see nothing wrong with the quotes.
- meritt 13y ago
  > I can also assure you that none of the data we have is ever going to be sold to anybody [2010] > Evidon sells two main services based on the data it collects [2013]
  - JimJames 13y ago
    This doesn't look good for ghostery but hypothetically both of these statements can be true. They may be referring to the idea that they don't sell an individuals data, only massed results, so no one can be singled out. This is how census data is used, the data itself is never sold but companies can ask for certain queries to be done on the data which are then performed by the census bureau and returned to the client.
    - fixanoid 13y ago
      Precisely. GhostRank collects and repackages tracker information on the web, not individual browsing habits.
  - Robin_Message 13y ago
    Companies don't keep promises. No company that buys another is going to be bound by something some developer said three years prior. I wonder if small startups doing popular things for geeks are heading towards a similar backlash against "selling out" that the alternative music scene had in the 80's and 90's.

nikcub 13y ago

the opt-in could be more transparent. I just installed Ghostery and the option says[1]: > Help Support Ghostery by sending anonymous statistical data back to Ghostery HQ. It is only when you click more information that you find out this information can be sent to other companies "Ghostery community..", and then only when you click on the FAQ and read the section about Ghostrank is it clearer how this information is being shared [2] and with whom. No mention of ad networks as clients. No mention of helping ad networks better target ads, infact their FAQ explicitly states: > Evidon doesn’t work to allow advertisers to be more invasive. Ghostery market to the privacy community. Their Twitter account[3] has been on top of the recent NSA story and other privacy stories and they promote their product as a solution for the privacy conscious. The way they have co-opted the community, funneling new users into their product via user ad tracking fears, while at the same time selling the data via a vague opt-in feels disingenuous to me. I think the 'fix' here could be as simple as acknowledging third-party sharing in that initial opt-in screen, and then updating the language in the FAQ to include clarification on how it is shared. [1] screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/xuRdj http://imgur.com/a/xuRdj [2] FAQ: http://www.ghostery.com/faq#q14 http://www.ghostery.com/faq#q14 [3] https://twitter.com/ghostery https://twitter.com/ghostery

sliverstorm 13y ago
I don't remember where I read about it, but I've known about it for a while. I was never particularly upset- I understood it to be aiding ad networks in targeting, which I think is a good thing. You seem to think this line implies they are not improving targeting: > Evidon doesn’t work to allow advertisers to be more invasive. But this says to me they don't help advertisers shoehorn ads in more places, not anything about targeting.
- nikcub 13y ago
  I'm indifferent to it, I knew they were collecting data, I didn't know where it was going from there. I have never used or recommended Ghostery because I don't believe blacklisting tracking targets is the solution. The 'more invasive' line isn't clear - it isn't a term that you find in other privacy policies. It would be difficult to be 'more invasive' than tracking with third-parties on the web the way it is today. I think they may be forced into expanding and clarifying that line and parts of the FAQ is this becomes a popular issue. I read that entire section and can't figure out what they do or don't do ..

artichokeheart 13y ago

Time for an open source alternative

byoogle 13y ago
Done :-): https://disconnect.me/ https://disconnect.me/ https://github.com/disconnectme https://github.com/disconnectme

Amadou 13y ago

I'm not too surprised to read this story. Ghostery seems to have redone their UI recently and it looks like one of those form-over-function redesigns that happen when a company comes into some money, decides to spend it on looking pretty but forgets to spend any of it on usability analysis. Since it sounds like their revenue does not come from the users, making it look pretty but less useful doesn't really hurt them as long as there are no competitors. In case anyone cares, when I say less useful I mean that the new layout makes it harder to individually enable/disable specific trackers in the cases where a tracker provides functionality necessary for the website to operate. The new layout is much more mouse intensive for anything but the trivial case of minimal trackers on a page. It's unwieldy to selectively enable trackers on sites with more than roughly 5 trackers on them because of the manual scolling-in-a-tiny-window layout and difficulty reading the list of trackers due to drawing lines through the text of their names.

fixanoid 13y ago
Hi Amadou, you should really post on our support board to get understanding or where Ghostery UI is going.

guelo 13y ago

NoScript doesn't mess around, it is hardcore and paranoid. I run it with the non-recommended "Temporarily allow top-level sites by default"/"Base 2nd level Domains" option in order to ease the pain a little bit. Still, sometimes I can't figure out how to watch a video, or leave a comment, or some other interaction. But I will suffer the pain, for the web is a brutal, unforgiving no-man's land. I think NoScript has saved me from some spear-phishing attacks. I hope. You just can't let strangers run code on your machine, no matter the sandbox. It's the reality that we live in.

qwerta 13y ago
Also noscript user. In my case I just disabled JS in Chrome and blocked a few sites in /etc/hosts.
- chalst 13y ago
  Dan Pollock's list of abusive IP addresses is useful for this (updated a bit more often than weekly): http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/ http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/
WickyNilliams 13y ago
It's a damn shame that it's not available for Chrome. There are various rip offs, with confusingly similar names, but the real deal is not available. Last I checked Chrome doesn't have sufficient hooks to block scripts early enough

mp3geek 13y ago

With the merger of Easylist and Fanboy's Adblock Plus List, using various combinations of subscriptions (adblock/privacy/social/annoyance) can make the need for something like Ghostery extension a thing of the past. /Fanboy

greyman 13y ago

I installed Ghostery just a few days ago, and it is clearly indicated that it is opt-in. I don't see a problem here, looks to me a bit like an attack against Ghostery. But of course, open-source alternative with the same functionality would be better... I find Ghostery as a good compromise for me; Noscript is too much hassle for a day-to-day use, and I also don't like to use Adblock for "philosophical" reasons. Ghostery does exactly what I think should be done - remove the tracking, since I didn't give permission to anyone to track me.

byoogle 13y ago
Isn't there a big difference between asking users to opt in to "share" their data with Ghostery (which is what Ghostery says) and asking users to opt in to have their data (what data, btw?) "sold" to advertisers (which is what Ghostery does)?

byoogle 13y ago

Ghostery claims that 45% of their users (8 million out of 18 million) are opted in to send Ghostery their browsing data. I wonder if even 1% of those users know their data is being sold to advertisers by Ghostery. I have trouble believing the solution to online tracking is even less transparent than the problem. I work on an anti-tracking alternative called Disconnect. We do this crazy thing where we ask our users to pay for our product. Oh, and lots of people also already happen to think Disconnect is better than Ghostery: http://lifehacker.com/the-best-browser-extensions-that-protect-your-privacy-479408034 http://lifehacker.com/the-best-browser-extensions-that-prote.... :-)

m-r-a-m 13y ago
I like Disconnect (I only found it a few days ago), but I'm trying to find out more technical information about what it does without having to look through the code on GitHub. Basically, does it provide additional privacy features on top of ABP+Easylist+EasyPrivacy? Also, why is it not listed on the Mozilla add-ons site? I barely found out about it. I think I was researching privacy extensions for Chrome and happened to click through to your website.
- byoogle 13y ago
  Thanks. Disconnect currently has the biggest list of tracking sites of any app (well over 2,000 sites). And our filtering engine is written differently than other apps (no slow regexes). In practice, we benchmarked the 1,000 most popular sites and found they loaded an average of 27% faster with Disconnect than without. I've also done some informal benchmarks of other apps (I should do a more formal study at some point) and can say Disconnect accelerates pages quite a bit more than them. Mozilla's review process is too sluggish for us right now since we're still making changes to Disconnect 2 quickly. When things are more stable, we'll probably submit to AMO.
  - kamiel 13y ago
    Is there any reason why Disconnect doesn't block Disqus and OpenX?

captn3m0 13y ago

Its weird that nobody mentioned Disconnect[1], which is an open source alternative to Ghostery. I've used it in the past, but shifted back to ghostery because it was buggy. [1]: https://disconnect.me/ https://disconnect.me/

byoogle 13y ago
I just mentioned Disconnect, but I make Disconnect. :-) You should try the new Disconnect (Disconnect 2) which has a lot more features than Ghostery and is even rated higher by users than Ghostery is. We just launched Safari and Opera versions today (and are also available on Chrome and Firefox).
- rs232 13y ago
  Any plans to accept Bitcoin donations?
  - byoogle 13y ago
    Yeah, I think later this week. (We actually had a Coinbase implementation before we launched, which we decided to pull last minute because we thought there was a little too much Bitcoin and Coinbase uncertainty at the time.)
- Semaphor 13y ago
  And thanks for it! It's blocking is great and the interface is by far the most userfriendly of the bunch :) I switched to it when it was mentioned on HN a few months ago.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- nly 13y ago
  Please consider accepting payments in Bitcoin! Also, does "Wi-fi security" conflict with HTTPS Everywhere? The features seem to be analogous.

crockstar 13y ago

I use Ghostery to see what is being tracked rather than block it outright. Call me foolish but I never realised that blocking ads was the primary intended purpose of the tool, I've always just used it to check for missing analytics tags and so forth.

zacmartin 13y ago

God forbid advertisers, who fund much of the content we consume online, get better at serving ads that are more relevant to the consumer.

ChikkaChiChi 13y ago

Not that this really does this, but I would be all for a better adblocking tool that did communicate back to whatever adhosting company presented ads on a page. If I opt in to allow my browsing behavior to help improve the sites I visit, I am presented the ads. When I click to disable an ad, I am presented some options: * The content is not relevant to me or the topic * The ad is intrusive or hurts my experience on the site Then let me decide to block all ads on the site, just this ad, or these types (e.g. popovers) on the site. The data can then be relayed back (again, I opted in) to the ad company and the site's owners and they might even be allowed to see browsing behavior that shows how much time you spend on the site. It could be a clear message to advertisers and content providers about the amount of revenue they are missing out on and why.

eliasmacpherson 13y ago

I guess now I see why people say "You misspelled ad block plus" when someone recommends ghostery.

Nux 13y ago

People might also be interested in the Request Policy addon, it acts by blocking all content that does not come from the site you are visiting. https://www.requestpolicy.com/ https://www.requestpolicy.com/

wheaties 13y ago

Can someone tldr this article? I tried to read it on my phone but the "view this on mobile" not only blocked all content but had an unreachable close button

cletus 13y ago

This thread like a lot of topics in this space is full of misinformation so let me dispel some common myths: 1. "I never click on ads" Irrelevant and, more often than not, a lie. But let's assume it's the truth. Search advertising is an example of intent-based advertising. It's why it works so well. If you're searching for camera then a site that sells cameras (via an ad in the search results) is likely relevant. Display advertising (which encompasses things like ads on the NY Times etc) on the other hand is not there specifically to drive a particular action. Brand awareness is a common use case. Search advertising is sold on a CPC basis because it is intent based. Display advertising is by and large sold on a CPM basis. You don't get the impression and the publisher doesn't get paid. Some will label this "theft". Personally I find this like many real world analogies to be inappropriate in the digital world. Pejorative aside, it is taking money from the publisher and users have largely shown an unwillingness to pay for the content they consume directly. 2. "I don't trust [ad company X]" The privacy argument. As this post shows, the temptation to resell your information, particularly by small players, is alluring. Frankly I'm more inclined to trust the Googles of the world than I am some guy who writes an extension. Google, for example, give you several options here. - You can go to the Ads Preference Manager [1] and tailor your privacy settings. - You can simply delete your cookies every hour/day/week/month/whatever. 3. "My ad blocking improves ads" I don't know where this sprang from other than ignorance of advertising is bought and sold. No impression, no revenue. The marginal improvement in eCPC based on not showing you an ad is a) irrelevant because display advertising is often not action-based and b) no increase in revenue since it's a smaller pool of impressions. Just today (still on the front page at the time of this post) is a submission about how people have a warped view of how much time others spend talking or thinking about them [2]. I believe the same distorted view of the world that most of us have also comes into play here. As much hand-wringing as there is about privacy, when it comes to advertising, advertisers don't really care about you, the individual, as much as money seem to think. What advertisers care about is groups of people with a particular profile ("segment"). So I respect the approach of being paranoid (or at least diligent/skeptical) when it comes to online privacy but, as far as advertising goes anyway, it's largely theater. I question the ethics of shifting the cost burden of the Internet onto others (ie tragedy of the commons) just because an image of a pair of shoes offends your delicate sensibilities is an interesting choice. I don't really click on ads either but I don't really care that ads for the Westin follow me around after I've gone to their site either (that's called remarketing or retargeting BTW). Whatever the case I'd rather Google have my browsing history than Ghostery any day of the week. I should note that I strongly believe in blocking obnoxious advertising. This includes, but is not limited to: - popups (actual browser windows or just HTML elements that block content until dismissed) - any video on a Web page that auto-plays - any sound on a Web page that auto-plays - most if not all interstitials - anything Flash based just because I don't want anything Flash based running on my computer It tends to be the sleazier side of the Internet that employ bad advertising practices like this but not entirely. Auto-playing media is particularly bad. Disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer in display advertising. [1]: http://www.google.com/ads/preferences http://www.google.com/ads/preferences [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5895648 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5895648

gyardley 13y ago

Can people really not tell the difference between 'my data is being sold' and 'an aggregate based on my data plus data from a million others is being sold'? A company that only collects data when the user opts-in and sells innocuous products like market-share information and tracking tag audits for individual sites hardly deserves the ire. It's not like it's the federal government.

Karunamon 13y ago
Apparently not. All tracking of all kinds even when completely anonymized is evil and bad and you should feel ashamed of yourself for even thinking otherwise /s

pessimizer 13y ago

I'm absolutely shocked that I don't seem to mind this or think that it's wrong. Turns out that my enemy isn't advertisers, it's being tracked all over the internet. I wish there was a way to exclusively allow static, non-tracking ads that just rely on the content of the site to target, rather than the content of my life. It'd be just like magazines in ye olden dayes.

icesoldier 13y ago
This is why I added an Adblock exception rule to allow ads from Project Wonderful. From what I can tell, PW's network only "targets" by matching sites to ads by category, which is decided by both the site and the advertiser.

retube 13y ago

won't blocking cookies from third party domains stop tracking? Or at least most of it.