Facebook declares war on adblockers, claims it can prevent them detecting ads

[Kimmo]

That’s it; I’d love to be no-scripting all over, but it was just an epic hassle. When the fuck is JS just gonna fuck off and die?

I thought HTML5 was supposed to save us all.

[anotherone]

JS, Flash, Silverlight. The whole lot can rot as far as I’m concerned. Does anyone else see this as a potential avenue for a new version of a cross site script attack?

[enso]

By definition, Facebook serving ads from within Facebook won’t be cross-site… That’s part of how they hope to avoid ad blockers.

[anotherone]

Quite right. But the ads aren’t created or originate at Facebook do they? It seems they plan to deliver ads residing on FB servers which do not originate from FB. While not technically a cross site script, the same risk would apply since you are going to be delivered content from unknown sources but it would appear to your browser that it originates from FB since that is the host delivering the content. I’m probably just paranoid but it seems like this could go badly.

[enso]

We don’t know what they’ll be serving.

[Gyrofrog]

I guess this is why I’m getting a lot of “Sponsored Suggested Post” entries that, until now, I’d only see on my phone.

@LDoBe

you’re awfully sanguine about some tracker from pornhub or whatnot

Would SEP (for example) stop it? Asking for a friend.

[KipTW]

I left Facebook years ago because they bought and killed an app that had been allowing me to see Facebook in a way that I could tolerate. How unsurprising it is that they continue to insist on forcing readers into an unsatisfactory experience.

[LDoBe]

@Clancy

I don’t know what kind of sites you visit regularly but a scary and increasing number I encounter seem to require JavaScript just to load text these days, let alone complete forms (despite the good old fashioned HTML forms still being an option)

What I said was that not many sites need JavaScript.

Although most have implemented it in a ham-fisted and browser-breaking way that’s totally unneeded. The few sites that do need JavaScript are the likes of Youtube and Spotify and such. Even the BBS doesn’t need JavaScript. It probably could be made to degrade gracefully into an oldfashioned forum.

I used to do web design, and my coding philosophy was much like Jazz. It’s the stuff you don’t write on the page that matters.

[NickSay]

Another problem solved by avoiding Facebook altogether

[enso]

@LDoBe

Although most have implemented it in a ham-fisted and browser-breaking way that’s totally unneeded. The few sites that do need JavaScript are the likes of Youtube and Spotify and such. Even the BBS doesn’t need JavaScript. It probably could be made to degrade gracefully into an oldfashioned forum.

Your idea of “need” or that of those who designed the sites and/or software?

Sure, we could all browse HTML only text with no images in Lynx because hypertext only needs text…

[enso]

@NickSay

Another problem solved by avoiding Facebook altogether

If only my brother, mother, grandmother and daughter felt the same, I could as well.

[anon63581570]

For all of Google’s missteps trying to get people to try Google+? They have been very good about no direct end user advertising.

[NickSay]

I hear that.

I’ve decided that I can handle the digital solitude. Thankfully a few generous peeps continue to contact me directly using primitive technologies like email, IM, SMS, and phone calls.

[Clancy]

Fair point, although you have to convince all of them of that, and they have a habit of learning how “important” JS is from each other and having weird ideas about how websites are supposed to work and look.