https://block.blokada.org/ Recent content on The Block - All about ad blockers and ad blocking. Hugo -- gohugo.io en-us Wed, 18 Sep 2019 07:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/09/18/how-to-get-free-access-to-blokada-vpn-using-stellar/ Wed, 18 Sep 2019 07:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/09/18/how-to-get-free-access-to-blokada-vpn-using-stellar/ We have been positively surprised by your interest in Blokada VPN. Over the last several weeks we have been working hard to improve it and provide features you ask for. Among other things, we have added multi device support, improved the UI design based on your feedback, added support for x86 devices and integrated several payment options. Today, we are adding another way to get access to Blokada VPN - using the Stellar platform. https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/08/05/freedom-isnt-free-vpn-edition/ Mon, 05 Aug 2019 16:49:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/08/05/freedom-isnt-free-vpn-edition/ Freedom Isn’t Free: VPN Edition In The Block’s last article, we covered what a VPN is and how it works, with a particular focus on the VPN used by Blokada itself. As a discerning consumer of technology, you might be interested in using a VPN elsewhere besides your Android phone. To get started, you may well want to use a free VPN—after all, why not take the opportunity to dip your toe in before going for a swim? https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/07/11/what-is-vpn/ Thu, 11 Jul 2019 12:30:00 +0200 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/07/11/what-is-vpn/ When you are using Blokada, you can be sure your data is handled with privacy in mind. Just like in the past, we still committed to protect your data and privacy. This is why we introduced the VPN feature in v4. But what is VPN, how that helps you to be anonym and security on the internet? The VPN acronym stands for Virtual Private Network. Usually companies use this technology to make their internal servers (e-mail, intranet) and systems available for their employees offsite or abroad, securely: the person connects to the VPN server (a gateway to enter to the company’s network in this case), which builds up an encrypted channel with the client (the employee) and then forwards the packages the client transmits to the systems and servers that otherwise wouldn’t be accessible from outside the office. https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/06/26/big-changes-in-blokada-v4/ Wed, 26 Jun 2019 07:40:00 +0200 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/06/26/big-changes-in-blokada-v4/ Blokada v4 is out for two days and it seems you like it, the group on Telegram has 304 new joiners at the moment I write this article, the social sites are buzzing. We would like to thank you to welcome the new version. There are 2 big changes in v4, and I am sure you already aware of them. Please let me address the questions around them. The first big change is the User Interface (UI). https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/05/27/on-the-ethics-of-ad-blocking/ Mon, 27 May 2019 07:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/05/27/on-the-ethics-of-ad-blocking/ Some time ago, I had a conversation with a fellow college alumnus wherein he asserted that ad-blocking is unethical on the grounds that it deprives content creators of revenue. The argument is a simple one, and not without merit: the content creators of the Web deserve to get paid for their work, and the primary channel by which they do so is advertising, so if you want your favorite news sites, comic artists, video entertainers, etc. https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/04/15/https-filtering/ Mon, 15 Apr 2019 07:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/04/15/https-filtering/ HTTPS Filtering: Sure, It Sounds Like a Good Idea Stop me if you’ve heard this one: you install an ad blocker (e.g. Blokada), but you still see those pesky sponsored links on Facebook, so you submit a feature request to the Blokada development team asking to the links to be blocked. It sounds like a simple enough request–just add a filtering rule to block those specific referrals. Unfortunately, the very mechanism designed to make Web surfing safer, https, adds tremendous difficulty to this task. https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/03/15/heads-up-on-blokada/ Fri, 15 Mar 2019 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/03/15/heads-up-on-blokada/ Blokada 3.7 released 3 weeks ago. A big milestone for us, this is the last minor version in version 3, and we would like to thank you all your support on the social sites, forums, all your donations and contribution on GitHub. The ideas you share make this application better and better with every new release. One big change that 3.7 ships is the opt-out option for log sharing. We are aware how different ad blockers handle private data, and it is a reasonable concern. https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/01/29/the-direction-of-blokada/ Tue, 29 Jan 2019 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2019/01/29/the-direction-of-blokada/ It’s been a while since the last time I made a post, and that’s because I’ve been really busy putting a lot of things together, which I hope you’ll find as exciting as I do. Also, we should have a look at the results of the most recent survey. So, let’s get to it! The first question was: What kind of Blokada would you like to see in the future? https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/10/09/blokada---simplicity-at-its-best/ Tue, 09 Oct 2018 06:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/10/09/blokada---simplicity-at-its-best/ You are impatiently waiting for the download page to load, after all it’s the file you were waiting for all day. . . Those evil, pesky, flashy popups “There are 13 singles within 12 miles. Click to chat.” . . *sigh* . . Finally download page loads. Hurray 👏👏 Now the only thing separating you from your file is the download link among 20 other “Download/Download Now/Generate Download Link”. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/17/how-does-blokada-work/ Sun, 17 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/17/how-does-blokada-work/ This article is brought to you by Sebastian, one of Blokada Insiders, and is the first in a series of articles aiming to improve your understanding of ad blocking, privacy and malware protection, and related topics. In very simple words, how does Blokada work and what is that VPN? We all know that blocking ads is certainly something we all want. While some developers in fact rely on the revenue coming from displaying ads on their apps, the majority of ads we want to block are annoying, they increase the amount of traffic and simply ruin user experience, to put it straightforward (personal advice: if you use an app whose developers seems to really depend on ad revenue, you can whitelist that app on Blokada, and URL requests from that app won’t be filtered). https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/16/platforms-vote-results/ Sat, 16 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/16/platforms-vote-results/ During May we’ve been running the platforms vote, which is part of my strategic planning of the Blokada future. Needless to say, this is very long term, since there’s a lot of things to implement on Android still, but, it’s always good to check what do you think. Especially because you are always keen on giving your feedback. :) This time we had 1039 responses, which is much more than before, although this survey was running for longer time than the previous ones. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/15/features-vote-results/ Fri, 15 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/06/15/features-vote-results/ Throughout April we’ve been running the features vote to see which of the proposed features are the most welcome among you. Today, I finally found some time to write up the results. :) This time we had 721 participants, which is great. This was a multiple choice survey, so one participant could vote on more than one feature (maximum 5). In total, there was 2317 votes. The most popular feature was HTTPS filtering (to block YouTube ads and encrypted ads) with over 20% of all votes. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/04/09/vpn-vote-results/ Mon, 09 Apr 2018 08:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/04/09/vpn-vote-results/ For the last month I’ve been running a survey about the possibility of adding VPN service into Blokada. The idea is that introducing independently from the existing ad blocking and DNS changing functionality will allow to support the project development long term. The survey was designed to help me understand what you think about this idea and how would you like it to work. As usual, I could count on your participation. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/04/03/blokada-translations-moved-to-crowdin/ Tue, 03 Apr 2018 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/04/03/blokada-translations-moved-to-crowdin/ During the last year we’ve translated Blokada to 15+ languages, with more than 30 languages in total being worked on. This is amazing! In order to make the job easier for translators, I decided to change the translation platform to Crowdin. Migrating existing translations took me many hours, and not everything went smoothly to say the least, but I think you will agree it was worth it - the new platform is much better! https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/23/branding-vote-results/ Fri, 23 Mar 2018 11:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/23/branding-vote-results/ Since users seem to confuse the name Blokada very often, I decided to check what the community really thinks about the branding. Over the last 3 weeks we’ve been voting on alternative names for the project, and we got some cool suggestions. Here are the results. The first voting was designed to test if we want to change the name at all. Surprisingly, 89% of users (from 1286 votes) is happy with the name Blokada, or at least think we should not change it. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/20/blokada-insiders/ Tue, 20 Mar 2018 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/20/blokada-insiders/ With the growing popularity of Blokada, I’m getting more and more questions about how can one help the project. Well, there is a lot of things to do with every single release! If you are enjoying Blokada and wish for its continued development, you can make a big difference by joining Blokada Insiders. Blokada Insiders is a welcoming group of people giving a bit of their time to help Blokada grow and improve. https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/02/blokada-v3-is-out/ Fri, 02 Mar 2018 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2018/03/02/blokada-v3-is-out/ Blokada v3 is now released and I’m gradually rolling out the update to all users. If you haven’t received it yet, stay tuned, or just go the download section. This release is introducing a lot of changes and improvements, and you’ll see all of them described in detail in next several posts. Meanwhile, here are the highlights: Improved “Keep Alive” feature. This is addressing the problem of Blokada being killed by the OS too often on some devices. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/21/blokada-ad-blocker-now-also-available-in-italian-and-malay/ Mon, 21 Aug 2017 20:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/21/blokada-ad-blocker-now-also-available-in-italian-and-malay/ The awesome members of the Blokada community just contributed new translations! As of v2.2, Blokada adblocker is now available in two more languages: Italian and Malay. A thank you goes to: Italian: htrex Malay: Syed This makes Blokada ad blocker speak 10 languages in total! Just a month after I’ve introduced translations support. What’s more, Hebrew and Persian are already in the pipeline (I need some more testing for those since they’re first RTL languages to be supported by Blokada). https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/21/how-to-use-quick-whitelist-actions-in-blokada-ad-blocker/ Mon, 21 Aug 2017 13:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/21/how-to-use-quick-whitelist-actions-in-blokada-ad-blocker/ Blokada 2.2 added a very useful quick actions menu to help you efficiently manage your whitelist. You can easily whitelist and un-whitelist all installed or system apps with one tap. You can also restore your filters to default configuration in case you messed it up too much. Note that it also resets the blacklist. Here is a video that demonstrates the quick actions menu available in the Whitelist section. Keep in mind a few things while using this feature in it’s early release: https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/17/how-to-whitelist-apps-in-blokada/ Thu, 17 Aug 2017 13:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/17/how-to-whitelist-apps-in-blokada/ Blokada 2.1 introduced a long-awaited app whitelisting feature. This is very useful for dealing with apps that do not work correctly with ad blocking. Some apps, like Google Play Store or GMail are whitelisted out of the box. As always, you have full control how Blokada ad blocker works, so you can easily add and delete whitelisted apps. Here is a video that demonstrates app whitelisting with XDA Labs app, which used to have problems with downloading apps if Blokada was on. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/07/blokada-v2.0.4-released/ Mon, 07 Aug 2017 13:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/08/07/blokada-v2.0.4-released/ Two weeks after Blokada v2.0 was released, and 4 iterations later, the new and shiny Blokada v2.0.4 is the most stable release to date! I’ll be pushing updates to existing users incrementally over the coming days. You’ll receive a notification as usual. If you don’t want to wait, just use the download links on the website. Just remember to download proper version (if you have Android 4, use the secondary link). https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/31/a-state-of-blokada-v2.0/ Mon, 31 Jul 2017 13:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/31/a-state-of-blokada-v2.0/ It’s been a week since Blokada ad blocker is open sourced and available for free. Here is a short summary of the improvements introduced between versions 2.0 and 2.0.2. I got great feedback from the XDA folks as usual, and I’ve been addressing reported problems as they come. The biggest issue was the stability around imminent network connectivity changes. Apparently, connectivity state events sent by the OS cannot always be trusted, so I introduced some mechanisms (including a watchdog) to make Blokada more aware of the actual state, while not killing the battery. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/31/blokada-speaks-german-and-dutch-too/ Mon, 31 Jul 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/31/blokada-speaks-german-and-dutch-too/ Thanks to the support of some amazing people, Blokada is now available in two more languages: German and Dutch. They’re out with v2.0.2. A thank you goes to: German: beatschubser, andre.mondri Dutch: Arjan, Samir Boulema Great job! Your language missing? I’ve made contributing translations as easy as possible. Go here to help. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/23/blokada-v2.0-is-out/ Sun, 23 Jul 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/23/blokada-v2.0-is-out/ Yes, Blokada v2.0 is out! With the source in the open! :D This is a very important release for several reasons: Blokada is an open source project now. This has a lot of consequences - you can read about them here! Translations are supported, and v2.0 comes with 6 languages straight out of the box! Expect more in future releases (we have German and Dutch in the pipeline). You can also help translating the app to your language! https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/23/why-is-blokada-open-source/ Sun, 23 Jul 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/23/why-is-blokada-open-source/ Starting with v2.0, Blokada is an open source project. Why I think it’s the best approach for developing an ad blocker, and what does it mean for the future of Blokada and its users? Read on :) So, why? Well, there’re many reasons. So far I have dedicated several months of my time to the development of this app. My plans towards Blokada weren’t (and aren’t!) limited to it being “just” an ad blocker, but I wanted to limit its initial functionality so that I can see, in reasonable time, if this app may gain enough traction. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/22/a-thank-you-to-the-translators/ Sat, 22 Jul 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/07/22/a-thank-you-to-the-translators/ Blokada v2.0 is available in six languages. This is only possible thanks to the contributions of several awesome people! I wanted to publicly say thank you to everyone responsible: Spanish: Wolf Igmc4 Portuguese: vinicastro, RinaldiMe French: Emmanuel.Viollet, stephtban Czech: misacek Polish: ew.lapinska English: well, whatever, it’s just me ;) So, thank you! Your language missing? I’ve made contributing translations as easy as possible. Go here to help. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/06/14/translating-blokada/ Wed, 14 Jun 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/06/14/translating-blokada/ Thank you for considering translating Blokada! Blokada has a convenient translation system in place that is meant to make your job easier. You can find it at: translate.blokada.org. Getting started Once you click the link, you’ll see all languages Blokada is being translated to. Click on the language you speak in order to see the files and their translation status. You can either use the “Translate All” button at the top, or choose any particular file you would like to translate. https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/06/08/blokada-v2.0-roadmap/ Thu, 08 Jun 2017 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2017/06/08/blokada-v2.0-roadmap/ It’s been exciting several months for ad blocking on Android. When I started developing Blokada, it was just a side project of mine meant to test some less-known Android APIs and capabilities of the platform itself. At that time, the only existing ad blockers for Android were eating battery like crazy and slowing down device. Plus, they were quite cumbersome to use. I wanted to see if it’s possible to build something that will block most of the ads across all apps, while being efficient and fast enough so that I won’t notice it in terms of battery life, or network bandwidth speed or device performance. https://block.blokada.org/post/2016/12/13/about/ Tue, 13 Dec 2016 12:00:00 +0100 https://block.blokada.org/post/2016/12/13/about/ The Block aims to provide you with up-to-date, detailed and complete information about ad blocking. Here you can find articles about ad blockers for all major platforms (Android, iOS, Web), app comparisons, extensions reviews, tips, as well as news from the world of never-ending arms race between ad block apps, publishers, developers and ad platforms. We touch everything from commercial ad blockers to open source community projects and provide you with recommendations and guides so that you can also make your life ad-free.