Optimal DNS Ad Blocker

Re:Optimal DNS Ad Blocker by stordoff on Friday July 29, 2016 @05:00PM (#12189954)

> One can achieve this locally, on a laptop/desktop, using https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts

I use this with DD-WRT to get network-wide filtering. It's not perfect (only updates on router boot), but good enough for me.

Additional DNSMasq options:

    addn-hosts=/tmp/ad-hosts
    no-resolv
    strict-order
    server=8.8.8.8
    server=8.8.4.4

Startup script:

    wget -qO /tmp/ad-hosts-v4 https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/hosts

    H_MERGE=/tmp/ad-hosts
    H_ORIG=/tmp/ad-hosts-v4

    sort $H_ORIG | uniq | grep "^0" >> $H_MERGE
    sort $H_ORIG | uniq | grep "^0" | sed "s/0\.0\.0\.0/::/g" >> $H_MERGE
    stopservice dnsmasq && startservice dnsmasq

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Re:Optimal DNS Ad Blocker by oliwarner on Friday July 29, 2016 @08:44PM (#12191075)

Urgh why do people have to be so POSIX about things. Here is the content of my /etc/cron.daily/adblock file:

    #!/bin/bash

    wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/hosts \
    | sort -u \
    | awk '/^0/ {print;print ":: " $2}' \
    > /tmp/ad-hosts

    service dnsmasq reload

I know cycles are cheap but that doesn't mean we should be spaffing them up the wall when we can do things cheaper. This avoids double-processing the downloaded content.

dnsmasq config as above.

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Re:Optimal DNS Ad Blocker by neurostimulant on Saturday July 30, 2016 @03:36AM (#12192029)

How is the performance of dns lookup when using dnsmasq? Is it faster than putting them on /etc/hosts? I tried putting the blocked domains in the /etc/hosts file, but the performance is terrible. It significantly increased dns lookup time on my i5 laptop (that was before I upgraded my laptop with ssd though), so I ended up configuring my own ad blocking dns server on a cheap Scaleway vps instead and never have any issue with long dns lookup anymore.

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Re:Optimal DNS Ad Blocker by jsingleton on Friday July 29, 2016 @05:39PM (#12190228)

Network-wide is the way to go. Hosts files can be tricky to set up on phones and tablets.

I run dnsmasq on a pi as my ISP router is pretty limited. You can't even change the DNS servers, so the pi has to do DHCP too.

I use it to block other things like fixed banner overlays. With caching you can get it to work when you go off WiFi too [0].

Not sure I'd use Google's DNS servers though. Your ISP's are probably better for both speed and privacy. You can test the speed with an old Google project called namebench [1].

[0] https://unop.uk/block-bbc-breaking-news-on-all-devices

[1] https://code.google.com/archive/p/namebench

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Re:Optimal DNS Ad Blocker by stordoff on Friday July 29, 2016 @06:03PM (#12190391)

> Not sure I'd use Google's DNS servers though. Your ISP's are probably better for both speed and privacy. You can test the speed with an old Google project called namebench [1].

Unfortunately my ISP's (Sky, UK) DNS servers aren't particularly reliable. My devices are behind the DD-WRT router that forces its own DNS settings (other servers are intercepted), but the rest of the family connects directly to the ISP router[1]. Multiple times I've been browsing the Internet without issue, but other people have been unable to use the Internet. Changing their device to use Google's DNS server resolved the issue.

[1] Been meaning to merge the two for a while, but haven't got around to it yet

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