Even the FBI says you should use an ad blocker

It's a bit like vaccination, educating people people about the various scams out there so they are prepared in advance.

> is there a danger that hiding them from people just means that they are more likely to fall for them when the inevitable happens.

Probably, but there's so much variance in human behavior and circumstances that your vulnerability to scams never drops to 0. A call telling you your child is in the hospital and you need to pay them because their check has bounced sounds a lot more convincing during times when you know your child is actually in the hospital.

My general advice is "If you didn't initiate the conversation with the party with the intent to take an action or exchange money and they want you to do those things then don't take action or exchange money until you reach back to that party via their official lines of communication or otherwise verify the situation makes sense". In the end it's not the method you use to scam someone that matters it's that you trick them into trusting you really represent something/someone you do not. This also helps with not-exactly-a-scam scams like special offers you didn't seek out but are being sold to you because it gives more time to think if it's really a good deal or think what the downsides would be.

You can give 1,000 examples of how fake urgency is created to make you skip that verification step but past the first one or two to explain the general concept of needing to verify it doesn't matter it just means you'll need 1,001 examples to give the next day.

This isn't bulletproof either but I haven't found anything generally applicable that solves the problem better without making more of a problem than it prevents on average.

> Given the prevalence in the real world of scams and fake ads - is there a danger that hiding them from people just means that they are more likely to fall for them when the inevitable happens.

Strong disagree. Once you've avoided ads for a while, the ads that do slip through seem bizarre and flagrantly manipulative. Ads work best on people who are accustomed to ads, to whom ads are normalized. Once you denormalize ads, they become less effective because their manipulative nature comes across plain as day.

> Apple already refuses to support browser extensions on their mobile OS

It's going to be interesting to see how Apple deals with this now that the EU is forcing them to allow users to install apps from alternate sources.

> Apple already refuses to support browser extensions on their mobile OS

My iOS Wipr extension begs to differ.

I currently have 17 extensions installed on my iPhone for Safari. There’s some overlap, but not total overlap with the 7 content (read: ad) blockers I have installed too.

That, and/or first-party hosted ad delivery.

Same. I tried to switch to iOS about a year ago, but I ended up returning the device after spending over $50 on highly-rated ad/script blockers for Safari, and finding that none of them really worked.

Back on Android, my daily life is blissfully bereft of ads, except when I visit somewhere with live TV. It's a shame, because Apple makes some great pieces of hardware, but I won't be back until they loosen up on controlling the software that I'm able to run on my devices.

DMCA Section 1201 criminalizes breaking any “technological protection measures” of any kind, unless there is an exception for it on a list decided by a librarian that changes every 3 years. It’s absurd.

Because the DMCA says that if you try to use property you own as if you own it, and that property came with DRM, you are a criminal. Stop thinking you own things pleb, that's not for people of your class and the masters decided to put an end to that nonsense.

(the thing you want to google for a non-snarky explanation: "anti-circumvention provision")