The Return Of The Pop-Up Ad 1129
SYFer writes "Shortly after upgrading my Macs to OS X 10.3.8, I noticed that I was getting pop-up ads on Safari. It had been so long since I'd seen a pop-up, I completely forgotten how annoying they can be. I went over to Apple's Support site to see if there was a relationship, but learned that the timing is just a coincidence (even though there's a lot of the usual FUD and flailing of arms in the discussion forums). In fact, it turns out that the pop-up advertisers (what's the proper denigrating term here?) have finally defeated the pop-up blocking functionality found in many browsers. MacFixIt is running a front page article on the topic and says 'Contrary to initial reports, this problem isn't limited to Safari; subsequent reports have noted pop-under ads victimizing a number of browsers that provide pop-up-blocking features, including the latest versions of Safari, FireFox, Mozilla, OmniWeb, and Camino.'"
been seeing this a while (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm vocal about it (see above) to convince people to stop viewing the sites that are infested with popups. It's the only way to resolve the problem - if a site endorses popups, they may get a short term boost in earnings, but they get a long term reduction in eyeballs, and in turn a reduction in earnings.
BOYCOT THE POPUP INFESTED SITES!
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyway, I'm not too concerned. I don't doubt that an update or plugin will be made soon to stop even these, if one's not already out and I just haven't noticed.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Informative)
Setting 'browser.block.target_new_window' to true in about:config seems to work, I haven't noticed any.
browser.block.target_new_window (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Overcome this. (Score:5, Interesting)
If there's some way to disable java/javascript/plugins per-website, please let me know.
Re:Overcome this. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Interesting)
That isn't the only way advertisers are getting around popup blockers. This only applies to FireFox, as it's all I use:
There's an element called dom.popup_allowed_events in about:config, which has stuff like 'submit click dblclick' etc.
One website that's nefarious for insufferable ads (zophar.net) recently added code to make clicking legitimate links trigger popup ads. My solution was to remove all allowed popup events by making dom.popup_allowed_events = ""
Yeah, it'll probably break a few poorly written image galleries; but if everyone starts doing this, maybe people will stop thinking its OK to pop open new windows to show images.
This method should still allow target="_blank" tags to work in hyperlinks, but has its own problems as well. For what it's worth, I also have not seen any popup ads since doing this.
Mod parent up (Score:5, Informative)
Seems to have fixed all those new popups for me.
Re:Mod parent up (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Informative)
You don't have to kill all allowed events, just hash out click and mouseup.
dom.popup_allowed_events = "change #click dblclick #mouseup reset submit" works well and still alows legitmate popups when you click form buttons and other user-requested behavior.
As always, you can always allow a site you need popups on.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Informative)
That said, I like the idea of NO popups of ANY sort without authorization. As long as Firefox clues me in that it stopped a popup so I can approve the site, I'm in. Though, I'd like to see a "one time" authorization. As in, I'm on some website I don't intend to be at again, I need to see one popup to complete some task, and that's it. I don't want it on my whitelist, I just want to see the one popup. Sort of like a firewall. Do I want to allow this: once, always, not this time, never.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Insightful)
If folks go through so much trouble to block the darn things, advertisers should realize that it's not a good way to advertise, and switch to a less annoying method.
Same idea applies with spammers and spam filters. Why do spammers try so hard to get through to people who hate spam enough to block it? They're definitely not going to be customers!
-Z
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Interesting)
The corollary would be that if specific popup blocker applications that need to be actually installed by the user used different methods to block popups, the advertisers would theoretically not try to stop these. I'm wondering if these popups will still get around Pop-Up Stopper, actually - it uses a much more no-nonsense strategy for stopping popups (ie, you cannot open any browser windows at all beyond the first one unless you're holding Ctrl or Shift - I've simply gotten used to that instead)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Insightful)
You know those cool X10 video cameras? I'm sure you saw the popups for those too. I might have gotten one if they weren't frickin' synonymous in my mind with popup advertisers. (Just like I'm never going to refinance my mortgage with a spammer, no matter how good a deal I'm going to get.) They look like a neat little geek toy, but I'm going to have to wait for another company to make them before I'll get one.
I guess I'm a little bit of
I know there are trade-offs and deals must be made in order to have low prices or provide good content for free. But there is a point at which I really feel like a place sucks, and at that point, I am willing to go through the inconvenince of finding someone else to deal with, rather than give money to those who would abuse me. It may work for other people, but if you don't serve me well, you don't make money from me.
It's not like there aren't other businesses who will take my money (or in the case of websites, my eyeballs) and give me what I want.
I wish more people did this, then maybe megacorps would treat people like
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Insightful)
Heh heh heh
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Interesting)
Advertisers take note.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Insightful)
It wouldn't surprise me if the advertisers aren't trying to do more than just find ways to get the pop-ups to show. Depending on what products they are trying to sell, I'd think they'd try to circumvent a certain browsers blocker.
If you know that your demographic is more likely to use Firefox or a Mac, why waste time getting around IE's defenses?
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Informative)
In every case I eventually tracked it down to either Flash or Java objects loaded into a page that requested a window be opened. Also in every case it seemed to be a well known advertising site that the object originated from.
The reason I never got any in Safari but did in Firefox is because I use Safari as my main browser so I've got PithHelmet [culater.net] installed, which comes with a healthy list of things to block, whereas I use Firefox only for testing so I've got little to nothing listed in my AdBlock rules. At work where I use a Linux desktop I have a healthy list of AdBlock rules.
If you're concerned about your privacy, avoiding ads, or popups you need to have at minimum AdBlock, CookieCuller and X installed for Firefox. If you're using Safari, PithHelmet is absolutely the best.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Informative)
Note that it doesn't always pop-up.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Informative)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:4, Informative)
FIX FOR FLASH POPUPS (Score:5, Informative)
- go to about:config
- right-click and select New/Integer preference
- make a pref called "privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins"
- set the value 2
Now plugins are treated just like javascripts trying to open popups--they get blocked by the popup blocker. You have the option then to show the popup or to allow them for that site if you want.
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:been seeing this a while (Score:5, Informative)
Well then... (Score:5, Interesting)
I tolerate text ads because something has to pay for the web, but popups and other abusive ads (like the huge flash ads in the slashdot TEXT ONLY service) just get blocked. The fuckwits deserve not to get any ad revenue for pulling stupid tricks like that.
Re:Well then... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm coming too. I'll go get my shotgun.
Re:Well then... (Score:5, Funny)
He uses a Compy.
Re:This isn't that serious (Score:5, Insightful)
That is not a viable option. 95% of the sites I (and almost every other web user) visit use javascript in some way, shape, or form. I don't want to take the mindset of "Flash is evil, images are a waste of bandwidth, java is pathetic (even though it is, but that's beside the point). The Internet is full of crap so I should just use Lynx." I like to see things other than plain text and images. I can deal with a couple of pop-up ads here and there until the next version of Firefox comes out.
Re:This isn't that serious (Score:4, Insightful)
They may use javascript, but that doesn't mean it's necessary. I've been surfing without javascript (or java, or flash) for many, many years now, and there are only a select few sites that even have reduced functionality because of it.
Netflix, for instance, requires javascript only to allow you to rate films, and works perfectly without javascript other than that.
The only place where javascript is usually needed is with drop-down lists, which is rather stupid, as a single button next to the drop-down would eliminate the need for javascript for them.
If you find a site that needs javascript, complain loudly to the webmaster, and you will see it change, most of the time.
Dude, you are so out of touch:-) (Score:5, Informative)
Are you really going to complain loudly to the webmaster of every little javascript-based site you want to use and wait for them to redo the site?
Do you realize that many sites are actually faster with javascript on, because there is a non-trivial application running on the client site, and it needs to download no (or very little) data for many of the requests, as opposed to loading the whole damn page every time you want to change the width of a column in a table?
Re:This isn't that serious (Score:5, Interesting)
The very concept of a pop-up blocker is stunning to anybody who has been using the web since before Javascript became common. (To say nothing of the folks who have been using the Internet since before it had websites on it!) I can think of very few features that were so bad that users begged for ways to prevent the feature from being used... And said feature wasn't removed from the product!
Can you imagine if car makers started including bombs in all their cars, and you had to get or make a special explosion-blocker? You'd think that it would occur to the manufacturer to just not install the bomb, rather than working on the ultimate explosion blocker!
I'm using more exclamations points than is my habit, but only because I find the situation so excrutiatingly baffling. If, in IE6, MS had simply not bothered to include the code to open new windows automatically, the world would be a better place, and few people would have felt the need to switch to better browsers. Any sane web designer has come to realise that their user's hate popups. Further, any sane web designer has to deal with the fact that their 'legitimate' popups are likely to be blocked. Thus, any sane web developer should just stop using popups as part of the actual site, so all popups can be assumed ads, and we can just abandon the feature entirely.
To quote Mr. Jeff Foxworthy's guide to UI design... When you have features that make front page news when they get used, because your users hate those features so vehemently, you might be a bloat-peddler.
Re:This isn't that serious (Score:5, Informative)
Go look at Google maps and Gmail. You can do some really good stuff now with Javascript, particularly as you can make a request back to the server with it and update part of the page without a reload.
Like any web tech it can be abused, but if you are a half decent developer the reason you are putting in JavaScript is to make the app a better experience for the user.
Maybe you want a world of basic pages and lots orf reloads, but most user seem not to.
How to not get pop-ups and keep your javascript on (Score:5, Informative)
Well, here is what I do in Firefox. I haven't received any pop-ups (yet). In the options dialog, under "Web Features" you'll find that on the far right across from the "Enable Javascript" checkbox is a button that says, "Advanced."
"Allow scripts to: " (remove check marks next to the following)
- "Move or resize existing windows"
- "Raise or lower windows"
- "Disable or replace context menus"
I also uncheck "Hide the status bar" but that's a personal preference.After unchecking those along with having the pop-up blocker enabled I no longer get any pop-ups. And I really don't see unchecking those having any profound viewability problems on the web. If a site needs to resize your window, it's usually because they want to open a pop-up along side it. :P Same goes for raising/lowering too.
Science Blog (Score:3, Informative)
Call me crazy (ok don't) but I thought I had spyware. I certainly don't. I'm running Firefox 1.0.
Hopefully they don't catch on too quick.
Re:Science Blog (Score:5, Informative)
You might want to try something similar. If things get really desparate, using an blocking HOSTS [mvps.org] file can help as well.
Re:About that HOSTS file... (Score:4, Informative)
The DNS Service in WinXP and 2000 Pro are simply caching services, you can disable them and have DNS still work. I do at home here because I have a DNS caching server on the gateway machine so I don't need another cache, it does speed things up in the proper configuration.
Re:Science Blog (Score:5, Informative)
In the arms race between pop ups and browser, I'll put my money on the Firefox team. There's no way to win the pop up battle against open source. Against MSFT, certainly. They develop at the speed of glacier.
I'm guessing the first couple pop ups the Firefox developers see they'll be writing a fix.
Re:Science Blog (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Science Blog (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Science Blog (Score:5, Informative)
X10 (Score:3)
correct terminology (Score:5, Funny)
Poppers? Plippers? Flippers? Flappers? Wippers? Snappers?
Sorry, kinda high on Red Bull right now.
Oh man... (Score:5, Funny)
Lynx is, and continues to be, the ultimate browser for ad-less internet browsing.
Take that, 21st century!
Re:Oh man... (Score:4, Funny)
Does anyone know if there some way I can get lynx or links to log into my US Robotics router? It uses standard home router authentication. But neither lynx nor links will work.
I'd try elinks but I can't find a Darwin binary and I don't have dev tools installed.
Re:Oh man... (Score:3, Funny)
I don't see a problem here... (Score:5, Informative)
In any event, it's going to be something of an arms race between advertisers and pop-up blockers. Ideally, these jerkwad marketers should realize that people using pop-up blockers do not want to see their ads and display them to someone else who does want to see them. If they can find anyone like that.
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:3, Informative)
Anxiously awaiting a fix.
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:3, Interesting)
The being said, I love my pop-up and ad blocking.
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:4, Insightful)
They do not care. The people putting up those ads are not the same people sellling you the piece of crap. The marketers, be it a division within, or a separate company, sells your eyeballs to the retailer/manufacturer. They don't care if you personally want the piece of junk or not. What matters is that you saw it. And they can sell that to someone.
One day, we will all realize that for a large segment of the industry, we are not the consumer. We are the product. The are selling your eyes/ears/minds/personal info. Every day, all day.
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Advertisers don't give a damn about that.
They know that some of those people -- admittedly a minute percentage, but in a game of millions a 0.1% click-and-buy rate can make you rich -- do not maintain the minimal essential commitment of an online citizen and refuse to ever buy something as a result of invasive, unsolicited advertising.
This is also the reason the telemarketing associations oppose the "Do Not Call" lists. They know that a portion of the people on these lists can still be persuaded to buy things from them.
Re:I don't see a problem here... (Score:4, Interesting)
A silly bit of sophistry, but they can get really worked up about it. If you have a high resistance to righteous anger then follow one of their forums for a couple days to get some insight into how they think.
Hmmm... (Score:3, Informative)
How it mostly works (Score:5, Informative)
Re:How it mostly works (Score:5, Funny)
the HREF line should readbasically, produces popups whenver you click on a link
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Funny)
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Informative)
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Funny)
Oh wait...
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Funny)
Not another one of these threads
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Funny)
Yep, 'fraid so.
Re:Um, no (Score:4, Funny)
Neither is yours, you newbie!
Re:Um, no (Score:4, Funny)
Hi! I just heard about this site from some of my hacker friends, and just wanted to say hi to you people!
Re:How it mostly works (Score:5, Informative)
Generally speaking, if javascript adds an onclick to a link that didn't have one in the original page contents, this should not be allowed to occur. Further, if javascript attempts to open a window as a result of clicking on a link whose HREF is a javascript link, the original page content prior to javascript DOM manipulation should be checked, and if the original contents were not a javascript HREF, the pop-up should be blocked.
Fix those two problems, and these pop-up ads should become a fading memory... at least until they come up with the next gross mechanism to do it....
Re:How it mostly works (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:How it mostly works (Score:5, Informative)
While I don't have one that does exactly this, I do have one for the more common "send the real url as a GET parameter" -- Fark.com and yahoo.com like to do this. An example from fark:
http://go.fark.com/cgi/fark/go.pl?
IDLink=1365
So rather than go directly to the NYPost, you hit Fark first, and Fark get to tell its advertisers, look at all the clicks on our links. It also means most clicks take a good long time, to hit fark and be redirected.
The Proxomitron regex not only makes the url the real url, it adds an "[orig]" link in a small red font, just in case it really is necessary (as on Yahoo) to go via the redirecting link.The nice thing about Proxomitron is that I not only don't get pop-ups, I also don't even get many embedded adds.
For example: on Washingtonpost.com's front page, I see only text adds. Bypassing Proxomitron (it's done with a bookmark) shows me three additional ads in Firefox, but even bypassed I don't see many, as I have a second proxy behind Proxomitron to filter out the "always bad" sites like doubleclick.
From where I sit, the web is a calm place with no pop-ups, no annoying ads, no distractions.
Re:How it mostly works (Score:3, Interesting)
If you find that somebody erroneously marked a site as blacklisted then you whitelist it and eventually the good guys out vote anybody who's trying to do another site harm.
Why??? (Score:3, Insightful)
pop-unders? yeah (Score:4, Insightful)
it really confused me, since like the submitter, i havent really seen anything like it for over a year...
First noticed this.... (Score:3, Informative)
They just don't get it, do they? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's sorta like this:
"SCREW YOU, POPUP-BLOCKING BASTARD!! Now buy our cheap cameras.
Hmm...
Re:They just don't get it, do they? (Score:4, Funny)
Drudge (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Drudge (Score:5, Informative)
http://z1.adserver.com/w/cp.x;rid=52;tid=4;ev=1;d
That javascript changes each time you load it (I think there are only a handful and the server picks one pseudorandomly). This means that sometimes it will hit you with popups, and sometimes it won't.
The code is obfuscated and I haven't sorted through it. The easy way to block it is to redirect z1.adserver.com in you /etc/hosts or block it at your firewall.
You may need to click on a link in order to experience the popup, though the links themselves are legitemate http hrefs.
Adaptation (Score:5, Funny)
I think I just confused myself. Yikes.
Mushroom mushroom (Score:5, Funny)
So....how long before firefox develops a popup blocker blocker blocker?
Blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, pop-up, pop-up
Blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, blocker, ARGH! Spam! A spam!
(apologies to weebl [badgerx3.com])
Adblock and Firefox (Score:5, Informative)
However, ever since I started using the Adblock [mozdev.org] extension, as well as keeping an updated list of definitons [geocities.com], I haven't had these problems lately.
What's the matter with advertisers?! (Score:5, Insightful)
How does defeating a measure designed to block your ads make good business sense? Does forcing your ads upon someone known to hate your approach produce good results? Does irritation equal a higher rate of return because people who hate your ads see them and have a change of heart? Do they say, "Hey, I had no idea those hateful ads were so interesting and useful to me. I think I'll buy their product."
Cuz my instinct is that when a person takes active efforts to banish you from their lives, forcing your way into their living rooms isn't a cost-effective approach. But hey, I don't work in advertising, as anyone who reads my About page on the headlines site knows. I like advertising in its place, but c'mon, if I kick you out of my house, stay there, please.
I kick em out, they still want in! (Score:3, Funny)
So Popup Ads are like Jehovah Witnesses?
Re:What's the matter with advertisers?! (Score:5, Insightful)
People on average are stupid bumbling idiots that want life to be as easy as possible, even if it means sacrificing their ideals.
The end result of this is that most people see a popup for, say, brand X of a digital camera. Later, when they are trying to decide on a digital camera, they remember brand X, they don't remember where they remember it from, but because they've seen the popup so many times, they remember it, and are therefore more likely to buy Brand X of digital camera.
Compounding this is the fact that even if they remember seing a popup for brand X of digital camera, if they want a digital camera, they aren't going to be thinking, or care about "if I buy brand X of camera, that means I'm supporting popups".
Same with websites that have popups, most people hate them, but when it comes down to it, it's easier for them to put up with the popups than to deny themselves of free flash greeting cards to spam their friends with or whateve else they may happen to be browsing.
Re:What's the matter with advertisers?! (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of technically unsavvy people have their computers configured for them by technically savvy relatives (cousins, nephews, neighbor's kids, etc...). These folks are a desirable audience for the advertising industry and so getting around the blocks is a good way to get at them.
Re:What's the matter with advertisers?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhm, How about SPAM? All it takes is one click to make it worth it to them.
Re:What's the matter with advertisers?! (Score:5, Interesting)
The site has to pay ad revenue per-click, right? Not per purchase?
Seems like a losing game to me... (Score:5, Interesting)
(But maybe that control is the ultimate plan of the ad industry - it would really make things easier on them...)
Example of a site that has it (Score:4, Interesting)
Gurinder Chadha believes Austen was a Punjabi in her previous birth! [hindustantimes.com]
Re:Example of a site that has it (Score:4, Informative)
Macslash had this... (Score:5, Interesting)
I sent them a brief email: I received an email from them soon after that they had sent to their advertising partner, TribalFusion:
Needless to say, I was very impressed, am browsing Macslash again, and have yet to see any more of these pop-ups.
-Paul
Re:Macslash had this... (Score:4, Informative)
There's a wonderful little extension for Safari called Pith Helmet [culater.net] that does a fair amount of adblock filtering, blacklisted hosts and some other voodoo. I can't remember ever seeing it 'break' a site or the design of a site: even ones using crazy CSS tricks to get revenge on those of us with adblockers. Combined with Safari's built-in popup blocking, I've yet to see the problem everyone has been metioning. There's a possibility that the ad servers responsible are in my blacklist.
At first I felt guilty for blocking all ads, even good-faith, not-horribly-annoying ones like on
God help you if you've got Flash, Shockwave or Java ads, though. All I see is a big white hole in the page.
Suffering from popups AND popup blockers (Score:5, Interesting)
So I suggested he sign up for Yahoo mail, because all the people I know who use it find it perfectly satisfactory.
He can't get signed up for Yahoo mail. I tried coaching him step by step over the phone. I can't be 100% certain of what's happening, but as I followed through the same steps on my own browser, he ran into troubles at exactly the point when Yahoo popped up a confirmation screen on my browser.
I'm about 95% sure he has popup blocking enabled and that's what's preventing him from signing up with Yahoo.
Of course, he doesn't know what a popup blocker is, or how to control it.
So, these days there are probably users who are suffering both from the new popups and from incompatibilities caused by the use of popup blockers.
Sure-fire way to block these guys (Score:4, Informative)
I'll second the recommendation of others here: block the ads at the DNS level. Windows users need to add entries to their local hosts file. Myself, running Unix at home, I use a three-step approach. First is a very small web "server" running on a scratch server. It's only job is to respond with a "404 Not Found" to any HTTP request (it does SSL and listens on ports 80 and 443). Second, I create a wildcard zone file for BIND that returns the address of my 404 server for any name in or below the zone's root. Third, I modify the named.conf file for the copy of BIND that serves my network, pointing each domain that's a problem (eg. "fastclick.net", "doubleclick.net") to the wildcard zone. Presto, as far as everything on my LAN's concerned any hosts in or under the domains I list now belong to me and my 404 server, not the companies who registered them. This can obviously be worked around by using IP addresses instead of hostnames in URLs in the ad HTML/JS, but nobody's doing that yet and if they do I can deal with it with some appropriate IP-level redirect rules in my firewall.
Advice to obnoxious advertisers: we control the clients, not you. If we don't like what you're doing, we'll do something about it. If you make it too hard to do something about it and won't change your ways, we can make you cease to exist. And with a Linksys router with custom firmware and configuration the non-geeks can get a turnkey solution too.
Solution (Score:5, Informative)
Easy work around for Firefox (Score:4, Informative)
1) Type about:config in the URL bar
2) find dom.popup_allowed_events
3) change the value to the empty string
Now no events allow popups by default. That means if you want to let a site pop up a window from Javascript you will have to whitelist it.
This blocked the popups on drudgereport.com for me when I tried it a few months back. I don't leave this setting on, for now, since I prefer to choose not to frequent sites that maliciously abuse me with ads. However, if it starts to become a regular nuisance, I will set Firefox back to this aggressive anti-popup setting. After all, nobody really NEEDS to use Javascript popup windows, and if I can see where a legitimate site is trying to do so, it only takes a few seconds to whitelist them in FF's popup blocker.
If you really, seriously hate ads, (Score:4, Informative)
2. Install Smoothwall [smoothwall.org] on it. It's free..
3. Install Ad Zapper following THESE [martybugs.net] directions.
Any and ALL system that you connect into your lan will have ads blocked whether they want to or not.
I wonder if there's a law to prevent this. (Score:4, Interesting)
I know this law is on the books maybe someone could point it out.
Code example (Score:5, Informative)
Basically, it just uses the age old technique of using the document.write method, but obfuscated, to write other, obfuscated tags which are not recognized by the blocker as being new script tags, which themselves call a new obfuscated pop.js code that actually, in yet another round of obfuscation, produces the actual pop-under code: In essence, if one can block any request for the server of the obfuscated pop.js, or pop.cgi or whatever code, one will be in peace for a while. This can be done via adding the following lines to the hosts file on Windows (C:Windows(or WinNT)\System32\drivers\etc\HOSTS) or on Linux or MacOSX (/etc/hosts) or simply via your firewall software, which I'm sure we all use, don't we?
127.0.0.1 www.fastclick.net
127.0.0.1 media.fastclick.net
I have the code from the above server, as used by scienceblog.com, but I won't post it, as it's copyrighted, because the last thing I want is some internet low life trying to sue me for their own low life purposes.
Bugzilla bug #253831 for Firefox (Score:5, Informative)
Re:hosts file (Score:3, Interesting)