In this article, we will tell you how to remove pop-up windows in your browser on Android, as well as how to permanently protect yourself from advertising and malware on Android.
Surely you are familiar with the situation when, when reading an article in a browser on Android, a pop-up window appears, and to close it you need to wait 5-10 seconds. And the question arises, how to avoid this?
So, to avoid pop-ups in your browser, you need to use appropriate methods.
How to remove pop-up windows in the browser on Android?
- Step 1. Open Chrome, the default browser on Android.
- Step 2. Click "Additionally"(three vertical dots) in the upper right corner of the screen.
Figure 2. Click on the three vertical dots. - Step 3. Click "Settings".
Figure 3. Click on Settings. - Step 4. Scroll down to the tab "Site settings» .
Figure 4. Click on the Site Settings tab. - Step 5. Tap a tab "Popup windows" to move to the slider that turns off pop-ups.
Figure 5. Click on the Pop-ups tab. - Step 6. To disable this feature, click the slider button.
Figure 6. Click the slider to turn off pop-ups. One offering is Ghostery, which is a popular blocker and privacy extension. On Android, it comes as a full-blown browser that gives you information about the types of trackers that are on websites. Here's how to block pop-ups using this app. (Again, this method will work in Android Oreo the same way it works in Android Nougat.)
- Step 1. Click the button "Settings".
Figure 1. Click on the three vertical dots in the upper right corner. - Step 2. Now you need to click on the gear icon to open the settings menu.
Figure 2. Click on the gear icon. - Step 3. Now you need to activate the function "Block pop-ups".
Figure 3: Activate your pop-up blocker. - Step 4. Alternatively, you can go to the section "Ghostery" > "Bug blocking options", and then select Figure 4. Set the Deny all actions option for the Bug Blocking Options tab.
This will reduce the likelihood that you will see any unnecessary pop-ups that would ruin your mobile browsing experience.
Other browsers offer a similar feature, but Ghostery has advanced capabilities in blocking intrusive and pop-up tabs, windows, and advertisements.
On the other hand, Google Chrome browser integrates well with Android, so using this browser with blocking enabled is also smart for those who want to avoid pop-ups.
Video: How to disable pop-ups on Android?
The Android system is the most open mobile operating system based on Linux, openness combined with an already familiar environment - causes a large flow of developers creating applications for the operating system. Developers are "people too" so they want to be rewarded for their work - saying in simple language: Many applications are created solely for the purpose of making a profit. There are not many applications created “for people”, but in this article we will only talk about such.
The first thing any user encounters after downloading a free application or game is advertising! Sometimes it doesn’t interfere or they give you a reward for watching it, this good example, but there are also bad ones. It’s very unpleasant when, due to the abundance of advertising in an application, you cannot use its functionality normally, or when advertising appears after each level in a game, and the ubiquitous advertising on websites is completely terrifying. There are several most popular formats advertising, we will protect ourselves from them.
Reasons to dislike advertising
I think you have noticed that advertising sometimes “guesses” what we want, or if we think about something, discuss it with friends, it immediately appears in advertising. Do you know how this happens? We are being watched :) Every action you take, be it a character entered or a page opened, is all saved in your “advertising identifier”, and according to those who show us ads, the data is used only to select more suitable ads.
Even the sound and geographical position are recorded for the selection of advertisements! You can simply go to a digital equipment store, this information will enter your ID and the system will decide that you are now interested in purchasing equipment. Sound can be recorded to improve results!!!
If you are worried about your personal data, don’t want all this surveillance, and are simply fed up with advertising in games and applications, we strongly recommend using the blockers from the list above.
Advertising is one of the ways to earn money for the creators of programs and applications. But what to do if the developers overdid it with its quantity or a spammer virus appeared on your smartphone? Let's take a closer look at how to remove ads on Android.
Types of advertising
Note! Let's consider only those types that are used on phones.
A small banner at the top or bottom, which can be displayed constantly or appear periodically.
- Interstitial - a banner that pops up on the entire screen. Video is often used.
- Disguised - after installing a malicious application, nothing happens (to avert suspicion). After a few days, advertisements begin to appear.
- Browser - located on websites. The location depends on the owner of the resource, because it is he who controls its placement.
- AirPush - appears in the notification panel. Most often used by attackers.
Programs to disable
Note! This method does not work only for AirPush.
Adguard
A very powerful blocking tool that has enormous functionality:
- filtering all traffic;
- setting up individual applications;
- White list;
- anti-phishing;
- HTTPS connection filtering;
- and much more.
The service is available for Windows/MacOS/Android/iOS. The only drawback is that the program is paid:
Note! 7-day trial available.
I believe that for such capabilities of the tool it is not a pity to pay the specified amount.
Let's go directly to the setup.
- Install the application from the website.
- On the main screen, click on the switch to activate it.
- Confirm that you are using a VPN connection.
Note! By default, the utility blocks display only in the browser. A paid subscription is required to filter all apps.
- Open the slide-out menu on the left → Settings.
- If you want to filter all programs, then go to “Basic settings” → “Filter traffic from all applications”.
- To improve the quality of work, return to the previous menu → “HTTPS Filtering”.
- Move the toggle switch to the active position → confirm the creation of the certificate.
- In the main menu tab “Application Settings” you can monitor the traffic flow for each of them.
- To block ads, select an application → tap on it.
- Move the “Ad blocking” toggle switch to the active position.
- Adjust other settings as necessary.
Adblock Plus
A popular service that is known by its browser extension. The functionality is not as extensive as the previous application, but it does its job perfectly.
If your device is not rooted, you will have to manually enter a proxy for each Wi-Fi networks. After the first setup, the utility will work in the background and filter all incoming traffic, which allows you to block advertising in applications and the browser.
Let's move on to activation Adblock Plus.
Adblock is now running in the background.
AirPush Lock
If strange notifications constantly appear, then you need to use the excellent Addons Detector utility. It scans installed applications and points to the culprit.
- Install the program and run it.
- Click “Scan” → “Ok”.
- Select the "Addons" sub-item.
- Select “Advertising” in the drop-down menu.
- The utility will display programs that send AirPush.
- Install and launch the application.
These applications must be deleted or access to notifications must be denied.
Removing adware
If advertising banners are periodically displayed on your device, this may indicate the presence of viruses. You can check for their presence using an antivirus.
Note! ESET Mobile Security will be used as an example. You can use any other (tested) antivirus software from the Play Market.
Utilities for Android smartphones that “cut out” annoying advertising in applications and websites are becoming more and more popular among users. The reason is that in Google Play There are already quite a few low-quality applications from unscrupulous programmers who litter the interface with flashing advertisements. And often with reference to the virus.
Blockers are a direct threat to Google’s mobile earnings. That is why the company recently launched a massive purge of such applications from Google Play. In February, the search engine released a security update for Android 4.1.2 and 4.2.2, forcing users of AdBlock Plus, AdBlocker, AdAway, AdFree and other utilities to manually configure a proxy server. And a little later, in mid-March, he completely evicted them from the repository.
Google motivated this step by the fact that third-party programs can arbitrarily redirect traffic, creating a threat to “phishing” attacks or espionage. The creators of the blockers were sent a letter stating that their applications violated clause 4.4 of the Product Distribution Developer Agreement: “You agree not to take actions (including the development and distribution of Products) that disrupt or interrupt the operation of devices, servers, networks and other properties and services of third parties, including Android users, Google and mobile operators, and cause other harm to them."
Adblock Plus, AdAway and others pose a threat not only to Google’s business. Installing blockers may also be unfair to the many small developers who distribute their programs on Google Play for free and hope to receive at least some compensation for their work. So everyone answers the question about the ethics of blockers themselves.
Utilities that disable ads have been removed from Google Play, so they can only be downloaded from developer sites. One of the most popular programs of this type is the open source Adblock Plus project, so we took it as a basis. According to the official website, ABP has been downloaded more than 200 million times. It is also available as an extension for Firefox, Chrome and Opera browsers.
Let's first consider a situation where you need remove advertising only from Internet pages. It's very easy to do. In Firefox:
Open your browser, click on the three dots icon in the upper right corner. Select "Tools" → "Add-ons".
. Go to the Mozilla Plugin Store by clicking on the orange package icon (opposite "My Add-ons"). Type Adblock Plus into the search field and click Add to Firefox.
. After installation, click on the 3-dot icon again and select "ABP: Enable". Using the same button, you can allow advertising to be displayed on specific sites.
The ABP browser plugin removes almost all advertising: on YouTube (including before the start and in the middle of the video), banners, pop-ups and others. True, she skips some announcements on purpose. To disable them completely, go to the add-on settings and check the box next to “Disable everywhere” and uncheck “Allow some unobtrusive advertising.” ABP is compatible with .
On the left - before enabling ABP in the browser, on the right - after
WITH blocking ad blocks in applications is more difficult. Without rooting your smartphone, ABP blocks ads only when connected via Wi-Fi. For a 3G connection, you will need to “hack” the device (gain superuser rights), but this is a topic for a separate guide.
So, to install ABP on an Android smartphone, follow the instructions:
Open “Settings” → “Security” and uncheck the boxes next to “Unknown sources” and “Scan applications”.
. Go to the ABP website (adblockplus.org) from a mobile browser and click on the Download button.
. Open the downloaded APK file and install the program.
. For security purposes, return the checkboxes in “Settings” that you unchecked in the first step.
Having completed the installations, ABP will select the subscription required for Russia (RuAdList+EasyList) and will update it regularly. We recommend leaving all settings at default (filtering enabled, launch on boot, periodic updates via Wi-Fi).
In most cases, the utility works right out of the box - you don’t need to configure anything else. However, some Android versions, especially in 4.2+ after Google's intervention, proxy configuration may be required.
For Android 4.x (Ice Cream Sandwich, Jelly Bean)
. Open “Settings” → “Wi-Fi” → hold your finger on the desired network, then tap “Change network” → scroll down the screen and check the “Advanced” box.
. In Proxy Settings, select Manual, and in Proxy Hostname, enter localhost. In the "Port" field, enter the number indicated on the notification panel (for example, 26571).
On Android 4.2+ (possibly the same as in earlier versions), the port may not be shown. The solution is this:
Connect to a Wi-Fi network. Go to "Settings" → "More" → "Mobile network" → "Access points (APN)". Open the point through which you connect to mobile Internet(for example MTS Internet). Rewrite the settings.
. Click on the three dots icon in the lower right corner. Create a new APN by clicking on "New Access Point". Enter the saved data, but put localhost in the “Proxy” field and 26571 in the “Port”.
. Save the APN and activate it by clicking on the circle on the right.
For Android 2.x (Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread)
. Likewise. IN Wi-Fi settings Click on the "Advanced" button. In the "Proxy Address" field, enter localhost, and in the "Port" - the number that ABP will show you.
For Android 3.x (Honeycomb)
The most difficult version for ABP, because... there is no manual configuration of proxy server parameters. If the smartphone manufacturer does not provide this option, then you will most likely have to root the device. In addition, some models have proxy settings in different places. The ABP website contains instructions for four devices (on English language): Alcatel
Many sites on the Internet are monetized solely through advertising, allowing their owners to earn money. If advertising modules are annoying, they can be easily removed - special plugins have been written for this purpose for all popular browsers. But how to remove pop-up ads on Android, which are no less annoying than ads on websites? There are such tools, which we will talk about in our review.
Removing advertising in the browser
Standard browser in operating system Android has such scant functionality that it is better not to use it. As a replacement, you should use the more advanced browsers Google Chrome, Opera and Firefox. The last option is interesting because allows you to install plugins that can remove excess advertising on opening pages.
To download the Firefox browser, you need to visit the application store Play Market and use the search. After installing the browser is finished, it's time to start fine-tuning it. We launch the application, go to “Tools – Add-ons – Overview of all Firefox add-ons” and on the page that opens we find the search bar - in it we enter the phrase “adblock”. In the search results we will find many interesting plugins:
- Adblock Plus is a multifunctional tool for blocking ads on any website. It has flexible settings and “cuts” advertising blocks well;
- Adblock from YouTube – removes advertising on YouTube video hosting (when watching videos in a browser);
- Adblock for Gmail – removes advertising modules from the Gmail interface;
- Adguard Anti-banner – removes advertising not only on websites, but also in in social networks(including Russian ones);
- Simple Popup Blocker – prevents pop-up banners from appearing.
Also in the plugin repository there are many other interesting and useful tools - they will remove all advertising modules, allowing you to concentrate on the main content of the page, and not be distracted by banners with the words “grandmother ate her cat,” etc.
The plugin developer has created a special browser for Android called Adblock Browser. It is installed from the Play Market application store and allows you to block almost all advertising displayed on the pages you open. Be sure to try this browser if you want to get rid of intrusive ads.
Blocking ads on Android in applications
Advertising in applications is the main type of income for webmasters, application developers and Google itself. It is presented in the form of pop-up banners in programs. Such advertising is very annoying; it often contains disgusting flashing banners, adapts to application interfaces, and threatens naive novice users with virus infection.
Why no one controls such advertising is unclear. Imagine the situation - you are a novice user, and suddenly you see a flashing banner that your device is infected and your contacts have been stolen. What will be your reaction? Naturally, this can cause consternation - few people would be happy about the leakage of important data. This is exactly what many advertising materials are designed to do - to intimidate a newbie and force him to install this or that software.
So, no one is going to control advertising materials, or rather their content. Then how to remove ads on Android in applications? There is no need to look for blockers in the Play Market application store - they are not there, since Google will not put such a pig on itself. Therefore, we will install a special Adguard application from the official website of the developer of the same name.
