How to prevent ad blocker from blocking ads on an app

Question

One of my users let the cat out of the bag and told me they were using one of my free apps, which is monetized by ads, but they were blocking the ads with an ad blocker. The

Answer 1

I am aware of one way that ad blocking works (on any computer really), they edit the hosts file to point to localhost for all known ad servers. For android this is located in the "etc/hosts" file.

For example, I use admob ads and a host file that I have taken from custom rom lists the folowing admob entries:

127.0.0.1 analytics.admob.com
127.0.0.1 mmv.admob.com
127.0.0.1 mm.admob.com
127.0.0.1 admob.com
127.0.0.1 a.admob.com
127.0.0.1 jp.admob.com
127.0.0.1 c.admob.com
127.0.0.1 p.admob.com
127.0.0.1 mm1.vip.sc1.admob.com
127.0.0.1 media.admob.com
127.0.0.1 e.admob.com

Now anytime a process tries to resolve the above addresses they are routed to the address listed to the left of them (localhost) in this case.

What I do in my apps is check this host file and look for any admob entries, if I find any I notify the user that I've detected ad blocking and tell them to remove admob entries from there and do't allow them use of the app.

After all what good does it do me if they're not seeing ads? No point in letting them use the app for free.

Here is a code snippet of how I achieve that:

        BufferedReader in = null;

    try 
    {
        in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(
                new FileInputStream("/etc/hosts")));
        String line;

        while ((line = in.readLine()) != null)
        {
            if (line.contains("admob"))
            {
                result = false;
                break;
            }
        }
    } 

I vow that all ad supported apps should check this file. You do not need to be root in order to access it, but writing to it might be a different story.

Also, not sure if there is any other files that act the same on a linux based OS, but at any rate we can always check all of those files.

Any suggestions on improving this are welcome.

Also the app called "Ad Free android" needs root access, meaning that it most likely changes the hosts file in order to achieve its goal.

Answer 2

Can you check to see if the ad loaded in your app?

Ad blockers work by preventing your app from downloading data. You could check the content length of the data in your ad frame to make sure there is data there.

If there is no data throw up a message and exit or warn you with an email.

It might not be as big an issue as you think since only a small percentage of people block ads.

Answer 3

There are two ways for a user to by pass a advertisement:

1) Use app without internet on.

2) With rooted phone and modified host file.

I made two tools that you can implement, see code below.

checkifonline(); is for problem 1:

public void checkifonline() {
    boolean haveConnectedWifi = false;
    boolean haveConnectedMobile = false;

    ConnectivityManager cm = (ConnectivityManager) getSystemService(Context.CONNECTIVITY_SERVICE);
    NetworkInfo[] netInfo = cm.getAllNetworkInfo();
    for (NetworkInfo ni : netInfo) {
        if (ni.getTypeName().equalsIgnoreCase("WIFI"))
            if (ni.isConnected())
                haveConnectedWifi = true;
        if (ni.getTypeName().equalsIgnoreCase("MOBILE"))
            if (ni.isConnected())
                haveConnectedMobile = true;
    }

    if(haveConnectedWifi==false && haveConnectedMobile==false){

        // TODO (could make massage and than finish();
    }
}

adblockcheck(); is for problem 2

private void adblockcheck() {
    BufferedReader in = null;
    boolean result = true;

    try 
    {
        in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(
                new FileInputStream("/etc/hosts")));
        String line;

        while ((line = in.readLine()) != null)
        {
            if (line.contains("admob"))
            {
                result = false;
                break;
            }
        }
    } catch (UnknownHostException e) { }
      catch (IOException e) {e.printStackTrace();}  

    if(result==false){

        // TODO (could make massage and than finish();

    }
}

Answer 4

There is nothing you can do that your users can't do better.

The only thing that comes to mind as remotely effective is to make the ads an inextricable part of the program, so that if they're blocked the user cannot make sense of/interact with the application.

Answer 5

For the case when there is no internet connection, I have followed this tutorial and I've build a "network state listener" like so:

private BroadcastReceiver mConnReceiver = new BroadcastReceiver() 
{
    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) 
    {
        boolean noConnectivity = intent.getBooleanExtra(ConnectivityManager.EXTRA_NO_CONNECTIVITY, false);

        if (noConnectivity == true)
        {
            Log.d(TAG, "No internet connection");
            image.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE);
        }
        else
        {
            Log.d(TAG, "Interet connection is UP");
            image.setVisibility(View.GONE);
            add.loadAd(new AdRequest());
        }
    }
};

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)
{
    //other stuff
    private ImageView image = (ImageView) findViewById(R.id.banner_main);
    private AdView add = (AdView) findViewById(R.id.ad_main);
    add.setAdListener(new AdListener());
}

@Override
protected void onResume()
{
    registerReceiver(mConnReceiver, new IntentFilter(ConnectivityManager.CONNECTIVITY_ACTION));
    super.onResume();
}

@Override
protected void onPause()
{
    unregisterReceiver(mConnReceiver);
    super.onPause();
}

registerReceiver and unregisterReceiver have to be called in onResume and onPause respectively, as described here.

In your layout xml set up the AdView and an ImageView of your own choice, like so:

<com.google.ads.AdView xmlns:googleads="http://schemas.android.com/apk/lib/com.google.ads"
    android:layout_alignParentBottom="true"
    android:id="@+id/ad_main"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="wrap_content"
    googleads:adSize="BANNER"
    googleads:adUnitId="@string/admob_id" />

<ImageView
    android:id="@+id/banner_main"
    android:layout_centerInParent="true"
    android:layout_alignParentBottom="true"
    android:layout_width="379dp"
    android:layout_height="50dp"
    android:visibility="gone"
    android:background="@drawable/banner_en_final" />

Now, whenever the internet connection is available the ad will display and when its off the ImageView will pop-up, and vice-versa. This must be done in every activity in which you want ads to display.

Answer 6

Give your users a way to use the app without the ads. I personally find ads one of the most annoying things that could possibly happen on my computer, and I will gladly pay for an application if it spares me the insult of having ads thrown into my face. And I'm sure I'm not the only one.