[Solved] To many blocker rules?

Usually you are be pretty well covered against all 3rd party data collectors using the standard eBlocker supplied lists. That's why we are supplying them 😀 😉 😎 

We added the ability to add custom filters ONLY(!!) as our "last feature" as eBlocker GmbH (the commercial predecessor to the Open Source project). This was implemented to make sure people can maintain and update individual lists in future - even in the case the commercial operations are closed down and the centrally supplied lists can not longer be maintained.

Today we are back thanks to our donors and are supplying the central list with the same level of protection as in the past.

I'd personally not recommend adding any more/other lists to the classic eBlocker "white cube" without disabling all the eBlocker supplied lists, as memory on these devices is too limited. Otherwise it will cause issues running stable!

Then you need to be sure your "individual" lists are "better" than what is hand picked by our team. Of course there might be cases and requirements to do so, but that is "your risk" and even I as a "tracking expert" wouldn't do this for my setup. So please take very much care while adding own lists - and do it with a very clear purpose only. Just "adding more" to "add more" is definitely not a good reason from my perspective.

Today there is no mechanism for end users to check list overlap within eBlocker and to my knowledge nothing is planned yet in this case.

Thank you Benne for diving into the ‘depths’ of the Blocker-rules!
As far as memory-considerations are concerned, this argument makes sense and the only option would be to buy new hardware. After investing in the ‘white cube’, a lifetime license and several donations, new hardware actually would make the ‘hobby’ called eBlocker a bit expensive:-)

I appreciate that standard blocking lists do the job for ‘run-of-the-mill’-use, but when using AdGuard Pro (i still do from time to time), i noticed from the DNScall-log that many connections from Google, Facebook and similar ‘bad guys’ were not blocked! (IMHO, AdGuard is not a bad blocker by any standard). For this reason i created my own blocking-list which i use in eBlocker.

For that same season i would appreciate if eBlocker would have a log-file where you can see who tried to connect where and when. Could well be that i expressed that wish on this forum before.

In general however, your message is understood; be cautious with new/other lists.

Rob

Well, if you made the experience there are trackers slipping thru: It would be great if you'd share them with us. If it's really trackers, then this is a quick improvement to make - and everyone profits from your help!

Nevertheless, when times come and you feel like "I'm getting a device now", get a Raspi 4 with 4 GB and add as many lists as you can find. I seriously doubt this is increasing privacy very much, but if it makes users feel better, that's half the cure 😉

From my perspective you can just lean back and let us take care of everything. That's what you paid for in the past and that's what we are here for still - even the business is closed now.

With the eBlocker Open Source project we love to help others to a high level of privacy - while making sure that most sites are working well still. And we are currently working on great features that will help less tech savvy users to a friction less eBlocker experience while still giving full control to the experts. Unfortunately monitoring is not yet on the "must have" roadmap for regular users.

Regarding monitoring for tech savvy users: You could use the (very early alpha) of the monitoring function to see eBlocker's behavior (Settings>Blocker>Analysis Tool) and the known HTTPs monitoring as well. That should give tech savvy people all the details - while not turning eBlocker to a surveillance device to spy on others... which is certainly the downside of detailed monitoring - and a privacy risk for others... 🤔 😮 

@robfranssen-fr @benne The adguard list is just domains as far as I have checked. I guess this fits the white cube domain filters still. Duplicates in different lists are eliminated automatically, so no worries about overlap. Only pattern lists use much memory: for speed optimization. But this does not apply here.

Just make sure to add as domain filter and you should be fine. 😎 👍 

IMO it‘s OK to add other tracker lists to get the best from „both“ worlds. But I agree: do it on purpose - so for a specific region/country/language it can make sense. Otherwise „overblocking“ will rather decrease your experience... 

@random @benne

Actually, i have AdGuard Pro 4.0.1 installed on my iPad.

In the past, i simply made a list of domain-names that were NOT blocked by AdGuard, but were considered ‘suspicious’ (colored yellow in the DNS-request-list of previous AdGuard-versions). This blacklist with some 200 domains (only) is enclosed.

Having said that, there is another item i would like to clear. The actual version of AdGuard has 2 sorts of protection, ‘Safari-protection’ and ‘DNS-protection’. To understand the various protection-categories, are these the same ‘animals’ as ‘Domain Blocker’ and ‘Pattern Blocker’ respectively as used in eBlocker?

I hope the both of you are not offended by my nagging on about AdGuard, but...

- i try to better understand which app/device does what and how

- which of the 2 does a better job IMHO

@robfranssen-fr Sorry, Rob but we are the experts for eBlocker. Please direct your questions regarding other vendors to those as we can only suspect what's going on and wont give a wrong answer.

My best guess: As long as a vendor relies on domains only (as Adguard does), it's probably just DNS filtering taking place. DNS only covers 80-95% of all trackers due to cloaking technologies which can not be covered by DNS.

To my knowledge, today eBlocker is the only central tech that is capable of pattern matching (next to some local plugins that only cover the respective browser).

Please feel free to add if you have other infos.

BTW: The attached txt file seems to be empty. Could you please try to re-up again (and check the correct upload afterwards)

THX!

@random

@robfranssen-fr Thanks for the repost. I just checked the list briefly.

Actually I couldn't find any tracker that is not covered by eBlocker. For example chartbeat, clicktale, xiti or vgwort - are all on eBlocker's list... so I'm not sure how you came to the conclusion these are missing with eBlocker?

On the other hand, there are very common generic domains on your list like amazon.com, adobe.com, ebay.com, linkedin.com etc. If we add this to our eBlocker filters - I'm sure many users are throwing stones at us... 😤 🤔 😮 

As much as I love to add enhancements to our lists, I fear your list is very individual and a no-go for the mainstream. Sorry.

THX anyway!

@random

One way of learning is by trial and error 🙁

And thank you for being a good teacher 🙂

Removed all ‘rules’ and rubbish introduced by myself and you know what?
eBlocker ‘solo’ works like a charme 🙂

@robfranssen-fr That's great news. We are happy if you are happy!! I've marked the thread solved. Thanks again for your input.