"Relevant" ads are creepy AF

found on Reddit

Presumably they can't actually read your mind. I assume they just correctly recognize that you're similar to people who have expressed the same thoughts you've only ever thought inside your head and are acting on that similarity, but it's still creepy.

Airborne malvertising can't be far behind

found on eBaum's World

It's one thing to put some advertising slogan into the sky by flying a banner behind a plane or something. You might even fit a short URL up there that way. This, however, lowers a lot of barriers to getting your browser to their web site. That can be a boon for people advertising a legitimate product, but also to people trying to compromise your device. 

I know there's some debate about whether QR codes are dangerous from a cybersecurity perspective, and I get that in certain contexts it's relative effectiveness as an attack make it less attractive than more traditional approaches, but this is a scale that hasn't been considered before - a single QR code that can reach millions of people at once.

I hear your ads knockin' but they can't come in

from here and here

I wish the interaction really was face to face. I would stare in their eyes to annoy them.

Your data's final destination

found on eBaum's World

You may lose people, but you don't have to lose data. It's clever, but I'm not sure I'd be caught dead using one of these.

Who'll scoop out the "Privacy Sandbox"?

from here and here

It appears that, under Google's new scheme, while you browse you're going to be added to various "interest groups" and then be shown ads based on those groups, and it'll up to you to go in and clear out/block the groups you don't want. 

In other words, the "interest groups" are the turds in the privacy kitty litter and you may well find that the job of cleaning it out never really ends.

One more reason to use Incognito Mode

from here and here

There are all kinds of legitimate reasons for keeping secrets, which is why you should be using every tool at your disposal to protect your privacy from the forces of surveillance capitalism.

As if we needed more reasons not to click on ads

from here and here

Ads on Google Search (among other places, most likely) have apparently gotten considerably more dangerous lately. Careful where you click. 

Packin' the K

Watch on YouTube

This cringy parody music video anti-malware ad from Kaspersky Labs is enough to make me wonder if maybe John McAfee wasn't the only security luminary on drugs.

Fine for thee but not for me

from here and here

As long as ad companies fail to crack down on malvertising, ad blocking remains a necessary security measure. Malware should not be the price of viewing web content. 

No clicks for you

from here and here

Of course heartless corporations are going to double-down on their toxic business practices, but don't listen to their arguments. Ads have been a security threat for a long time, and if an advertising company hasn't come to terms with that fact about the Internet yet then they don't deserve your attention.

Don't let that be the chosen one

found on Reddit

You should definitely use an adblocker to protect you from malware served through ad networks, but maybe not that particular adblocker. It seems to have a conflict of interest.

But it's "for your security"

from here and here

Twitter and Facebook have both been caught misusing the 2FA details for ad targeting and they are probably not alone.

There are many ways that online sites could have chosen to implement two factor authentication. It stretches credulity to think that they just happened by accident to choose the one that benefits their advertising businesses.

No, I think any security benefits were actually a secondary concern and that's why the online world has settled on a technology that is actually inferior from a security perspective.

No cell phone number for you!

from here and here

Twitter isn't even the first company to get caught misusing security contact information for ad targeting, but at least they're paying the price for misusing our info. 

So much for trustworthy computing

from here and here

Windows 11 Pornado Edition seems like the obvious conclusion to Microsoft's experiments with putting ads into the operating system. I wonder if they had that in mind.

Privacy - Is that really Apple?

Watch on YouTube

It's too bad Apple silently went back on the privacy promise this ad is making.

The street finds it's own uses for things

found on Acid Cow

I know there are ways to get around it, but the simple YouTube pranks of the past are spoiled now that ads (of all things) give people a chance to see the true title of the video before seeing it's actual content. 

So now you have to ask yourself, what do you want to be protected from more - advertisements, or hearing about how Rick Astley is never gonna give you up or let you down for the umpteenth time.

It's your devices' home too, y'know

found on Izismile

If your phone was a person that you lived with, would you be as surprised to find them referencing things the things you've said while they were in the room with you? 

Treat your digital roomie the same way you would a nosy biological equivalent.

Look at me, I'm the adblocker now

from here and here (source tweet)

If you're technical enough you might be able to save your expensive smart TV from the clutches of advertisers, but I tend to think it will be easier for most people to just download their TV shows from the Internet, and then what's the point of paying for a fancy smart TV? Viewers are going to take whatever path gives them the better user experience, and filling the top half of a navigation screen with ads is not a good user experience.

Unfortunately, that solution only works for smart TVs. It's not going to save you from ads on smart fridges or other smart devices. The Internet of Shit is rapidly becoming the Internet of Shitty Ad Players.

You were supposed to block them, not join them

from here and here

I block ads because I hate ads. If an adblocker makes ads that is not going to make me want to use that adblocker - quite the opposite, in fact.

That's gonna be a nope from me, dawg

from here and here

If the NSA and CIA are blocking ads, maybe disabling adblock isn't such a good idea after all. Maybe the advertising industry needs to clean up their act so that the government isn't pinning a giant hazard label on them..