Blocking ads by matching on 'HREF' attribute
Posted: Fri Aug 12, 2011 1:51 am
I recently did a double-take when a bunch of strange, gaudy images appeared on a website I frequent. It took a moment for the brain to get into gear, but I eventually remembered these things are called "ads" by the masses.. Strange that ABP wasn't picking them up.
The basic format was a script embedded with the page:
Then later on, when they wanted to insert an ad it looked something like this:
The gobbledegook in the IMG SRC attribute and the name of the script's function were both apparently randomized with each refresh, as were various document elements. So not possible to match on IDs, etc. I'm completely uninitiated with writing ABP rules, but after some fiddling I found I could hide the ads using the rule:
But this got me to thinking: why isn't this a more standard approach? The regular set of blockable rules could be applied to anything that's contained with an <A> tag with a nasty looking HREF value. Or is this a standard approach by some subscribe-able filter list already?
The basic format was a script embedded with the page:
Code: Select all
<script type="text/javascript">
function drjdEFHl(type) {
<set some cookies and variables>
if(type==1){
ret = '<a href="http://adserver.adtechus.com/adlink/...<snip>..." target="_blank"><img src =/eksjEbR/ehWja/eksjEbR /></a>';
} else if(type==2){
... <same idea> ...
}
return ret;
}
</script>
Code: Select all
<div id="IMrxfTQz">
<script type="text/javascript">
if(adblock) { // FF_Chrome
document.write(drjdEFHl(1));
}
</script><a href="http://adserver.adtechus.com/adlink/...<snip>..." target="_blank"><img src="/eksjEbR/ehWja/eksjEbR"></a>
</div>
Code: Select all
##a[href*="adserver"]