The FBI approves ad-blockers. The holiday season is a busy time for online scammers. Fortunately, the FBI has weighed in and advised using ad blockers to be secure.

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The agency recently issued a public service message warning that fraudulent advertising can be displayed at the top of search results. These ads can be particularly convincing when they impersonate well-known businesses.

The FBI said that advertisements for cryptocurrency exchanges may look legitimate, but when you click on them, malware may be placed on your computer. This is a method of stealing personal information and ultimately your money.

The FBI approves ad-blockers: being careful

Other suggestions from the agency include putting the website address of the company you’re looking for directly into your browser rather than searching for it. And also check the URL before clicking on a link to ensure it is real by looking out for spelling mistakes.

The FBI advised businesses to use domain protection services so they may be alerted when similar domain names are registered. This way they can alert clients of any bogus websites.

Ad blockers accomplish exactly what they claim to do. They stop advertisements from showing up on your browser. The main advantage is that you won’t be slowed down by slow-loading adverts like movies.

However, they also stop these advertisements from following you. Thus, preventing giant data harvesters like Facebook and Google from learning about your online surfing patterns.

This makes the agency’s announcement unlikely to be well received by big tech. These appear to be balancing trying to stop their use without disturbing the sizable user base of such extensions.

Popular ad blocker uBlock Origin recently voiced concerns about forthcoming API changes in Chrome. These changes appear to prevent the functionality of both uBlock Origin and other ad-blocking plugins on chromium-based browsers. Opera and Microsoft Edge are chromium-based browsers.

Additionally, Google announced in the summer that Android VPN apps that block adverts won’t be accessible through the Play store anymore.