Youtube's Anti-adblock is illegal in the EU

So many corporate bootlickers here, damn.

This whole thread is a whole lot of hullabaloo about complaining about legality about the way YouTube is running ad block detection, and framing it as though it makes the entire concept of ad block detection illegal.

As much as you may hate YouTube and/or their ad block policies, this whole take is a dead end. Even if by the weird stretch he's making, the current system is illegal, there are plenty of ways for Google to detect and act on this without going anywhere remotely near that law. The best case scenario here is Google rewrites the way they're doing it and redeploys the same thing.

This might cost them like weeks of development time. But it doesn't stop Google from refusing to serve you video until you watch ads. This whole argument is receiving way more weight than it deserves because he's repeatedly flaunting credentials that don't change the reality of what Google could do here even if this argument held water.

Everyday I think the European Union for preventing the internet from being worse than it could be. It's sad that back when the internet was a cesspool was so far the best age for it. Normies really do ruin everything

Every tech article I read nowadays I feel like has the appendix, "which is illegal in the EU." Lol

Cool, so YouTube will start putting pop ups that require you to consent to the detection in order to watch videos. That's what everyone did with the whole cookies thing when that was determined to be illegal without consent.

I only just posted a meme about the EU flooring companies for going against their regulations. It was my first post too :)
I'd really like to add YouTube to it. Godspeed.

unless it is strictly necessary for the provisions of the requested service.

YouTube could quite easily argue that ads fund their service and therefore an adblock detector would be necessary.

Thank fuck for EU and GDPR

... We're gonna get another cookie click-through, aren't we?

Another three cheers for the EU! 🇪🇺🍻🥂

EU to the rescue again!

I am not paying for Premium again until they bring the dislike button back.

Don't ask how, but my dad found out that at least with Ublock, cleaning the cache in the addon makes it bypass the stupid pop-up.

As an English person I thought yay that means us. Then I remembered. . .

Not that the social media corps have ever given a shit.

You should all go file a complaint with a data protection agency.

The thread in the linked social network suggests concentrating the complaints to the Irish DPC: https://forms.dataprotection.ie/contact

So is this basically saying youtube isn't allowed to detect an adblocker?

I'm not sure I really follow why that specifically is something they're policing.

And then we have Chat control V2…

This isn't the solution people think it is. The only thing Google needs to do now to make it legal is to force a prompt asking for your consent where if you disagree you are completely blocked off from the site. That is, assuming Alexander Hanff, the one carrying on this narrative since 2016, is correct and interpreted the response correctly. In Article 5 of the 2002/58/EC there is a second paragraph that states the following:

Paragraph 1 shall not affect any legally authorised recording of communications and the related traffic data when carried out in the course of lawful business practice for the purpose of providing evidence of a commercial transaction or of any other business communication.

I'm no lawyer, but I tell you who has them in droves, Google and YouTube, whom I'm sure have already discussed whether their primary means of business revenue, ads, could be construed as a commercial transaction for which evidence is needed. I'm not sure how a two page reply from the EU commission to his request telling him Article 5 applies really helps the guy out if Article 5 also includes the means by which YouTube is allowed to run scripts that provide evidence that ads have been able to be properly reproduced.

Still, assuming Alexander Hanff is right, Google just needs to add a consent form and begin blocking access to all content if users disagree, so it seems to me his claim is damned if he is right, and damned if he isn't right.

How is YouTube detecting adblockers? Wouldn't it be with the information the user's browser is already passing to them?

Well if the problem is consent for running the js on your client they can just say if you don't consent you cant access youtube, problem fixed.

uBlock Origin has no issues with blocking ads.

I get trying to fight it via legal means, but it is a solved problem.

Do you wish for more consent popups or do you hope that youtube is afraid of causing friction and will go back to how things were?

While I kinda sympathise, I won't be filing a complaint. I want Youtube to become so shit that even the average user will start looking for alternatives. I want ads plastered everywhere on that site and adblockers to fail miserably at blocking them. I want the average user to be so bothered by the ads that when they stumble upon an alternative they try and convince people to switch. I want content creators to be so bothered by it that they make videos promoting the use of another service.

Make this a competition for alternatives. Don't make it easy for users to stay on Youtube.

This is frivolous and ridiculous.

If europeans had spent as much time building youtube competitors as they spent trying to find holes to litigate, europe would be richer

I'm all about sailing the seven seas, yar har, but at some point the time spent trying to circumvent ads exceeds the $15. Support the people you watch. Hell, I pirate games and if I like it I'll buy it later. There's a difference between not getting taken advantage of by corporations and just straight screwing over people trying to make a living.

The way the guy was flexing about being an "expert", while it may or may not be true (I haven't independently verified his credentials), is extremely offputting. Refusing to engage with hecklers is a better policy than flexing with your education, credentials, and experience.

I'm all for personal freedoms but you're getting a service you pay no money for and then get pissed that they are getting the money out of you another way. Sound like people being petty.

I think the internet is turning to shit and that Google/Youtube is greedy like every other conglomerate.

But… they have to get something from people using there services. I personally use YouTube like an iPad kid so I have premium. I like the EUs tech laws but I don’t think they should rule that a computer can’t push ads (assuming the ads are not malicious)

Fine. We all agree ads sucks. But I struggle to understand why you people keep fighting against a company while simultaneously being apparently so addicted to their products. Just do yourself a favor and stop using it altogether.