According to the latest news, Google is planning to introduce an ad blocker to Chrome in 2018 and they are warning publishers to prepare for this big step. The warning has the intention of allowing websites to evaluate their own ads and to take out any of them which are disruptive. This happens because the ad blocker Chrome plans to implement cannot block all the types of ads available online. Instead of this, it will be able to block the ads on the pages that have been signaled to have an excess of annoying and intrusive ones, such as autoplay videos with sounds or interstitials that cover content.
An Important Step Forward
According to Sridhar Ramaswamy, who is in charge of the Google ads, even the ads belonging to Google will be blocked, if the page they are on does not meet Chrome’s criteria, as he explained in a blog post. At the same time, the Wall Street Journal reports that Google refers to the upcoming feature as an “ad filter” and not an “ad blocker”. This happens because it is still going to allow ads to appear on pages that are okay with the standards in place. The blocker is available on the desktop and on mobile too.
As such, Google is offering a tool that publishers can use in order to find out whether the ads they put up on their websites violate the requirements and will be blocked for the Chrome browser. The authority which determines if an ad is appropriate or not is the Coalition for Better Ads, made up of Facebook, Google, News Corp and The Washington Post.
However, the feature is still kind of controversial, since there are indeed huge benefits for publishers and consumers, but then again it does offer Google more power over the web in general.