Hello there,

Recently, I've become increasingly concerned about the constant monitoring of my online activities by various social networks and Internet services, regardless of my consent.

To illustrate, let's take a simple example: last week, I spent a few hours browsing through watches on eBay. I didn't use any search engine like Google or Yandex to find them, I simply visited eBay directly. I don't have any browser toolbars installed and I use private browsing mode whenever possible. Moreover, I always make sure to click the "log out" button before leaving any website where I logged in.

Yet, despite all these precautions, advertising networks persistently bombard me with watch advertisements day and night. It's understandable that eBay shared the information with advertisers, but how did they manage to identify me? Additionally, we all remember the infamous analysis of Facebook cookies, which are notorious for their invasive tracking practices.

Overall, this situation saddens me. I'm even considering going online using a virtual machine and reverting to a previous snapshot after each website visit.

This leads me to the idea of only providing my data to others when I truly want to. Perhaps the simplest solution would be a local DNS proxy equipped with a comprehensive database of advertisers, search engines, social networks, and so on. By default, the entire database would be directed to 127.0.0.1, only allowing access when the proxy detects that I deliberately navigate to a particular website like facebook.com.

Banning browsers from downloading data from other domains is not a feasible option as it would disrupt the functionality of many websites that rely on multiple interconnected domains.

I wonder if such a solution already exists in the world?

It's no surprise that eBay includes the code for doubleclick.net, which is essentially Google in full force.

For instance, Kaspersky automatically blocks all ads in any browser without the need for additional plugins that consume Firefox's memory.

Moreover, you can also disable third-party cookies (cookies from external websites).

The only solution that provides relief for me is modifying the hosts file, where most pages that typically display banners instead show a message stating "this page does not exist."

Currently, I have around 150 entries manually added in the file to block specific advertisements.

On a related note, it's worth mentioning that there are various browser extensions available that can assist in blocking ads and improving online privacy.

Implementing this solution won't be a straightforward task; it would also require developing a browser plugin.
For both the DNS server and the proxy server, it doesn't make a difference whether you manually entered the address in the browser's address bar or if it was embedded within a webpage. Therefore, there are essentially two options: either create a customized ad-blocking extension for your specific needs or set up a squid server where you can manually allow or block the sites you dislike.

consider the ongoing cat-and-mouse game between users seeking privacy and advertisers trying to track their behavior. Privacy-focused tools and techniques are continually evolving to adapt to new tracking methods, making it important to stay informed and explore diverse approaches to safeguard personal information.