I have 3 objectives:
(1.) Understand and found some ‘one-in-all’ options to be filled in custom options.
(2.) Is it worth to overdeploy protection other than brave inbuilt options?
(3.) What is mistake I have made by deploying of extension ‘ublock origin’ (not to be confused with ‘ublock’) with my brave at maxed out things
There is no need to use two blockers, they will conflict with each other and you just spend more resources. Built-in one is almost as good as uBo and it is faster.
An all-in-one list is not really feasible, there are too many variables involved. It’s better to curate them yourself and chose ones that are designed for what you are specifically looking to block. For me, that means the following:
The only extensions I’ve added are a pop-up blocker and an autoplay stopper. Shields is set to be aggressive with both trackers and fingerprinting. All combined this setup provides me very good protection, yet the resource load is light enough to make my browsing experience fast.
You don’t need any of these. Just enabling Fanboy Annoyances and enable Aggressive mode in shields, and you’re set. The rest are already included in Brave
Are you suggesting that all 4 of those lists are already being loaded by Brave? If so I’ll disable them, no need to double-load any list. My goal is to use as few lists as possible, yet still get excellent add and tracker protection.
@theJman you can check on places like https://browserleaks.com/proxy which are set to try to check what content filters a person is using. It’s not something you’d necessarily encounter in the wild so isn’t much of a concern. With everything at its default and no extra filters on, Shields uses:
Default (no filter enabled) = 9 filters
Brave – Firstparty specific filters
Brave – Social
EasyList
EasyPrivacy
Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list
uBlock filters – Ads
uBlock filters – Badware risks
uBlock filters – Privacy
uBlock filters – Unbreak
With Fanboy’s Annoyances + uBO Annoyances enabled = 14 filters
A lot of people fall into the misconseption that enabling more lists brings better protection. The reality is not, and often opposite like https://www.reddit.com/r/uBlockOrigin/comments/1cl3qgh/ads_getting_through/. Fully understanding why it is will require you to actually work on filters, but in a nutshell;
Exceptions (= allowing request) are prioritized to blocking in ad-block filters.
More filters cause more baits blocked, which results in adblock-wall or ad reinsertion.
Using uBO over Brave Shield is pointless, use either one alone.
As usual your answers are clear, concise, detailed and very helpful. You’re a true asset to this forum.
To set the stage… I have Aggressively Block Fingerprinting and Aggressively Block Trackers & Ads enabled. Using 3 popular test sites I first tried the configuration I had (see above). Once completed I disabled all those lists, cleared the cache, closed Brave and reloaded it. I then used those same 3 sites to test again. The sites I used are:
When I ran that setup against browserleaks it returned the following lists:
Brave – Social
EasyList
Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list
uBlock filters – Ads
uBlock filters – Annoyances
uBlock filters – Badware risks
uBlock filters – Privacy
uBlock filters – Unbreak
It doesn’t see half of what I have configured. I imagine it’s almost impossible to determine exactly which lists are being used though, but with as ubiquitous as EasyPrivacy is you’d think it could at least identify that one.
Using Braves default configuration the results were as follows:
Identical to what the other configuration was, in essence the other lists provided no value.
When I ran that setup against browserleaks it returned the following lists:
Brave – Social
EasyList
Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list
uBlock filters – Ads
uBlock filters – Badware risks
uBlock filters – Privacy
uBlock filters – Unbreak
The bottom line is it looks like the default lists are well curated and do a very good job. I’m sure information about what lists came already enabled was published someplace, but I certainly missed it. The overall browsing experience seems to be a little faster too, which would make sense with less items for the adblocker to sift through. Not sure how much of that is the placebo effect though.
Agreed, which is precisely why I’m trying to find the fewest lists that give the most protection. It’s proven to be a bit of a challenge though. For example, a lot of adblockers claim they can handle popups, popunders, overlays and the like. I have yet to find one that does anything with those things so I have to installed a popup blocker extension. Same with autoplay videos, some adblockers say they stop those but none do. I have an extension for that as well.
@theJman Shields regularly handles popups, popunders, overlays, and similar elements. Just to clarify, are you familiar with how content filters are created and managed? These filters rely on specific rules and syntax to block ads, and there isn’t an automatic way to block everything on every site.
Filters are constantly maintained by people like Fanboynz, Yuki2718, and others, but advertisers and websites frequently update their scripts to try to bypass ad blockers, which makes it an ongoing challenge.
Are there any particular sites where you’re running into these issues?
For me Shields doesn’t handle popups, popunders or overlays, they are ever present. Adding a popup blocker extension does eleminate most of them though. For example, weather.com shows a privacy popup with just Shields. Dan Post Boots and Wolverine both have popups for discounts on your order, Shields doesn’t stop them either.
I am indeed quite familiar with how the filters are created and managed. I maintain a document with about 60 URL’s to a multitude of them; everything from AdGuard, ABP, EasyList, Fanboy, Peter Lowe, uBlock, you name it I might have it. There are the full lists, optimized versions, ones that are DNS-based, there’s quite a variety among them.
From that group I did add EasyList’s antiadblock because I do run into sites whining about me running an adblocker. That’s it however, the rest are just the default ones now.
@theJman what’s interesting is I don’t see anything of what you’re referencing from weather.com or Dan Post Boots. However, I do see what you’re speaking of on Wolverine.
I’m guessing this just means is something that someone maintaining filters would have to add, if it’s going to be removed. We can use Brave’s tools to block the element but then the scroll bar breaks.
I’m not sure if @Yuki2718 or @fanboynz might give some more insight on whether this type of thing is intended to be blocked (which I’m assuming it’s not), but then also what might need to be added in order to block the modal without losing access to scrolling.
That’s rather odd, if I disable my popup blocker extension all 3 sites show them 100% of the time. Shields has never blocked a single popup on any of those sites. But then again, this is not the first time Brave has acted differently for you than me. Who knows at this point.
@theJman I just went back to visit Wolverine to see if I could come up with a content filter for it but when I did, that modal no longer appeared. I’m guessing Yuki or Fanboynz may have handled it. If not, then someone happened to adjust content filters for it.
Anyway, guess I’m curious if you notice the same thing.
