Facebook will bypass desktop ad blockers, but new opt-outs emerge

As one of the internet's biggest sellers of online adverts, Facebook has shown real concern at the rise of ad blocker software, so much so that it's found a way around them. It's not paying to be on a white list either, but has promised that affected users will have new options to select the kind of adverts they want to see.

“Facebook is one of those free services, and ads support our mission of giving people the power to share and making the world more open and connected. Rather than paying adblocking companies to unblock the ads we show – as some of these companies have invited us to do in the past – we’re putting control in people’s hands with our updated ad preferences and our other advertising controls,” Facebook said in a blog post.

Moving forward, while ad blockers may be less effective on the desktop version of Facebook itself, there will be new account controls to tweak the kind of commercials you see. “Ad preferences,” lets you deselect certain kinds of adverts, say for cars or animals. If you are added to the customer list of a particular company and keep seeing their ads, you can opt out of them too.

No longer will one Google search or purchase lead you to see the same products for sale everywhere you go on Facebook.

Facebook goes on to wax lyrical about how adverts are actually great, because they help you stay informed about what's out there. That is true, but of course adverts aren't designed to help the consumer, they're there to help sell a product to benefit the company that took the ad out in the first place.

Still, Facebook hopes that with its new controls, the reasons people turned to ad blocking in the first place will be assuaged. These preferences will be available to all, including mobile users, though it is only the desktop Facebookers that will see their ad blockers run into difficulties.

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KitGuru Says: As much as we all hate online adverts, sites like KitGuru wouldn't be around if we didn't have them, so please consider whitelisting us if you run an ad blocker, it really does help. 

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