Comment by Jerry2 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Jerry2 | Hacker News Reader

About a year or so ago, my dad called me out of the blue and told me that my mom was crying because "internet ads were following her and making her anxious".

Earlier that day, she came from a doctor and ended up searching for a medical condition on a famous search website. After that, she started seeing ads for various bullshit remedies all across the internet. Almost every website she visited, showed her same types of ads. Even when she wanted to forget and take her mind of it, she couldn't because these ads were constantly reminding her of it.

She got so disgusted that she quit using the web for the rest of the day and cried.

I guided them on how to install ad blocking addons and how to change default search engines (she now uses Startpage) But we couldn't easily block it on iPad so the solution was to switch the search engine and clear cookies.

All these companies that make money off tracking people and are selling search results really need to rethink their business models.

PS: She also wrote an email to Tim Cook complaining about this and got a reply from someone that they will "look into it". I'm glad Apple will now a provide solution to block these kinds of things on an iPad.

That's called "retargeting" [1]. In some cases it feels harmless, in others it feels very creepy. I tend to use incognito windows when I search for things I don't want following me around everywhere, to avoid them getting stuck into tracking cookies. But I assume most people don't, so it causes them trouble.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_retargeting

I am constantly affected with this on mobile devices (no ad blocker). It is so intrusive. But its laughable at the same time, because those ad serving engines try to predict me, but show me utter bullshit ads for things I accidently viewed before.

So, I really look forward to iOS 9. And whoever provides a proper blocking app will get my money!

ads are the only reason i use firefox on my phone. its the only mobile browser with extension support

thogh thats the only good thing about it... i'd much rather use opera or chrome, as both are better in almost every way

I recently switched from FF to Chrome on Android, because on Android Chrome gives me a better experience (mainly text resizing).

But this morning I was searching for adblockers on FF android, because ads.

I don't web much on my phone, but the extensions are bookmarked in my head, and probably the weekend I'm going to setup my FF with uBlockOrigin and Ghostery at least.

It'd be nice if I could run a web proxy on my phone that blocked ads regardless of browser or app.

I now choose to believe that your mother is responsible for Content Blocking Extensions on iOS. Please thank her for us.

I'm sorry but how do you know it was the search website that sold information? It could as well be the first web site that she opened that happened to be on the same ad network as other related web sites she visited. Just guessing.

I agree with your point, but to the user it can feel like a violation of privacy, and at that point it's not particularly important who's doing it.

Whether it's the faceless search engine or the faceless retargeting company, the net result is that something you thought was personal and private feels less so.

Said search website was probably google. If that's the case they don't have to sell it, they just use it to target ads from their own network. If you search something on Google it will follow you like the plague.

Ever click the little X or > in the corner of an add? Google has a bunch of settings you can set.

As for creepy ads following you around though I haven't personally found that to be a google thing.

Google expressly does not do that kind of retargeting. Its policies prohibit retargeting based on "health or medical information": https://support.google.com/adwordspolicy/answer/143465?hl=en

I know that the previous post didn't mention Google, but people might leap to the wrong conclusion. I don't know what Yahoo and Microsoft's policies are.

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