I break it down and let you know why you should be using an Ad Blocker and how it can help keep your family safe online.
Many people shy away from using ad blockers because they want to support the free websites that they frequently use and trust.
But is there ever a good time to use an Ad Blocker?
The average internet user knows the frustration of clicking on a link to a website they’ve never been to only to be bombarded with loud, obnoxious, and intrusive ads. Even those who staunchly refuse to install an ad blocker are tempted to make an exception for these kinds of sites. But ads aren’t just annoying, they can even be Dangerous as many ads contain methods to track the user, and worse, some even contain malware.
For most adults, avoiding clicking on suspicious ads seems pretty straightforward, and running antivirus software regularly in order to catch well-disguised viruses is a fairly common routine.
However, this isn’t something that young children are typically concerned about. It can be difficult to convince even teenage kids that it’s important to regularly run antivirus scans when they’re probably only interested in using their devices for entertainment purposes, especially if they’ve never had to deal with malware before.
And the younger kids are even more susceptible to malicious advertising…
They might not even understand that what they’re seeing is an ad. Most adults know to be skeptical of a popup telling them that they’ve won a cash prize for being the 1,000,000th visitor to a website, but does the average 11-year-old know better?
According to the American Psychological Association, “Mature comprehension of advertising occurs no earlier than age 7–8 years on average.” In other words, they might not be able to tell the difference between the YouTube videos that they watch and the ads that play in the middle of them, or between the funny comic or memes they’re viewing and the banner ad above it. There’s also no shortage of ads that will offer free stuff to users willing to give them personal information, which can seem very tantalizing to young kids who don’t yet understand the value of privacy.
But on top of protecting your kid from seeing ads in the first place, Ad Blockers will also prevent the ads from tracking your child’s internet activity and from gathering data on them.
Many websites and search engines will build a profile for each user and cater to the advertising to them specifically.
It’s important to also make sure that you’re using the right adblocker. Try to find the ones that have a large user base already and have received positive reviews. Some sketchier ad blocking extensions have been proven to sell user information to third parties in order to garner a profit.
