Defeating adblock detectors: popularmechanics.com
June 23, 2018 —
shinohai
While viewing websites in a graphical web browser, occasionally I find a site that hates when one uses adblock plus and prevents viewing unless it is turned off or the user pays for an "ad-free" pass. popularmechanics.com is one such website, and the nag screen remained despite the fact I was also running NoScript. What do?
As it turns out, the solution was baby simple. PopularMechanics uses a 3rd-party site to detect users running adblock, so all I had to do was add the following to /etc/hosts:
127.0.0.1 hearstapps.com
I was then able to smugly continue my research without sharing the page with hundreds of crappy ads, or being forced to pay for a pass on a website that I visit at most twice a year.
Feliz Sabado, mis amigos.
