Presented by Jonathan Kim: December 2015 The most talked about, hyped, and controversial ad tech today is Ad Blocking. Just how fast is it growing, and how is it going to be dealt with? This presentation will address the present state of ad blocking while making a few educated guesses on how the online ad industry will evolve from this.

1. The Current State of
Programmed for TMK
Jonathan Kim, Digital Engineering Director
12.10.2015
Ad Blocking

2. AGENDA
• Background and Origin
• Current State and Facts
• Publisher Response
• Looking Forward

3. ADBLOCK IS OLDER THAN FACEBOOK
2002 2006 2010 2012-14 2015
Student in
Copenhagen
writes first
AdBlock code for
the Phoenix
browser (now
FireFox) as a
side project
Available on
FireFox
Available on
Chrome
Available on
Android (‘12),
Internet
Explorer (‘13),
and
Safari (‘14)
Available on
Apple iOS
ADBLOCK

4. HOW DOES IT WORK?
A piece of code looks for content on websites that
are making requests to known ad servers. The ad
is blocked before the call is made, and won’t count
as an impression. This means advertisers do not
pay for any of this.
All ad types are affected besides a small number
of Native Ad units, but this will change very fast.

5. WHY IS IT SO POPULAR?
SECURITY PRIVACY
WEB
EXPERIENCE

6. NOBODY IS SAFE ONLINE
“Everybody should be
running adblock software,
if only from a safety
perspective …”
Edward Snowden, Nov. 12 2015

7. INFILTRATING MACHINES
Chrome is the most
popular browser today
Browser extensions add a
lot of utility in so many
ways. Like…Ad Blocking!
These extensions get
updated automatically
for ease of use
Sometimes, it can take as
little as a few hours to
create an extension
Malvertisers buy out these
extensions and mutate
them into adware monsters
Machines are exposed
unknowingly
1 2 3
4 5 6

8. REPLACING ADS WITH @#$!^%
Mutated browser extensions can replace regular ads with
fake ads that drive traffic to sites that could install malware
or whatever shady purpose set up by the malvertiser

9. HTTP
S
A MORE SECURE WEB STARTS WITH
brought to you by,

10. AS FOR WEB EXPERIENCE…
TRY IT
IT IS
AWESOME
Just don’t freak out when you’re trying to QA live ads and can’t
find them. They’re being blocked.

11. BY THE NUMBERS
ADBLOCK

12. RAPID ADOPTION
0
50
100
150
200
250
Jan '10 Jan '11 Jan '12 Jan '13 Jan '14 Jun '14 Jan '15 Jun '15
Number of active users in millions
(Global, all devices & browsers)
Source: Adobe / PageFair
AdBlock Plus has over
300 million global installs
Ad blocking has grown 41% in
the past year

13. TOP ACTIVE USERS BY COUNTRY
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
Poland Greece Sweden Denmark Canada Australia Portugal Finland United
Kingdom
Spain
Source: Adobe / PageFair
Europe has the largest user base
UK ad blocking increased 82% YoY

14. GROWTH IN THE U.S.
45
MILLION USERS
48%
YoY GROWTH
16%
ADOPTION

15. SITE CATEGORIES WITH ACTIVE AD BLOCKING
USERS
0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
Gaming
Social networking
Technology/internet
Education
Sports/recreation
Financial services
Automotive
Search engines/portals
Restaurants/dining/food
Political/social advocacy
Travel
Health
Personals/dating
Real estate
Charitable organizations
Goernment/legal
Source: Adobe / PageFair
Global User Data
Q2 2015

16. GLOBAL USAGE BY DEVICE AND BROWSER
Chrome is the most popular
browser for ad blockers
Chrome’s Global Market Share
Aug 2015
53% 33%
Mobile ad blocking
is not an issue yet
2%
OF TOTAL BLOCKED ADS
IN-APP ADS ARE
UNAFFECTED
AVG. TIME SPENT
MOBILE WEB: 13%
IN-APP: 87%
Source: ComScore

17. iOS ENABLES AD BLOCK
Timing of Apple’s announcement led to a lot of speculation because…
They also introduced the News App with
custom advertising capabilities
and these ads
cannot be blocked

18. BLOCKING
ADBLOCK

19. BLOCKING CONTENT

20. PAYING ADBLOCK DEVELOPERS

21. AD-FREE EXPERIENCE

22. and THE FUTUREADBLOCK

23. BOTH SIDES HAVE VALID CASES
Source: Adobe / PageFair
VS.
SECURITY, PRIVACY,
EXPERIENCE
QUALITY OF CONTENT,
PROFIT, THE INTERNET

24. WILL THIS BE AN IMMEDIATE ISSUE? NO.
41%
11%
7%
53%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Laptop/desktop Mobile Tablet Don't use ad blocking
Source: Adobe / PageFair
Percentage of internet users who use ad blocking software in the
United States as of February 2015, by device
Adoption in the U.S. is still skewed towards men below
the age of 29 who are technically savvy

25. ADS ARE HERE TO STAY,
BUT CHANGE IS INEVITABLE
Publishers paying ad block extension developers is not a
viable solution.
Blocking content establishes an adversarial wall between
publishers and users.
Charging money for an ad-free experience will only work
for larger companies at a limited capacity.

26. PREDICTING THE FUTURE
Regulation on how many ads unique users are exposed to
on each unique site they visit1
Less automation and more custom ad experiences with
premium publishers centered around content
2
More cross-app experiences that add utility to the user
experience (i.e. using Uber in Google Maps without opening
Uber app)
3
Cookie/Device ID-based ad monitoring technology that give
users full control over exposure along with the type of data
that is shared with advertisers
4

27. THANK YOU