uBlock Origin detects Stealth Mode POST request

  • Resolved RockYourBlog

    (@rockyourblog)


    2 months, 3 weeks ago

    Hey there,

    I recently noticed a weird drop in my visitor data in GA and while looking at CAOS, I noticed that the Stealth Mode (Pro) Feature no longer bypasses all adblockers.

    Tested this with Chrome & Firefox while having uBlock Origin enabled. ublock seems to detect the /wp-json/caos/v1/proxy/stealth POST request and blocks it. This occurs on multiple websites I have CAOS installed on. A few months ago, everything was still working and ublock wasn’t able to detect the request. Other adblockers seem not to be affected and won’t block the request.

    I would like to know if there’s a way to restore the adblock bypass regarding uBlock, or if this method has now been officially “detected” so it will no longer work with this adblocker. If that’s the case and since uBlock Origin is one of the most popular blockers (at least I think it is), I will reluctantly have to switch. Hosting GA locally isn’t difficult, but the adblock bypass is a unique selling point of your plugin.

    Cheers
    Philipp

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • Plugin Author DaanvandenBergh

    (@daanvandenbergh)

    Hey Philipp!

    Thanks for notifying me! I’ll look into that and look for a fix.

    Will get back to you before the end of the week!

    Plugin Author DaanvandenBergh

    (@daanvandenbergh)

    Hi again Philipp,

    I’ve looked into this, but I regret to say that I haven’t found a solution yet. uBlock is blocking the request with a filter, which seems to be aimed directly at blocking self-hosted Google Analytics instances. It’s formulated in such a general way, which makes it very hard to work around it.

    I’ll research it again this week, and hopefully I’ll come up with a solution. I’ll keep you posted!

    Plugin Author DaanvandenBergh

    (@daanvandenbergh)

    Hi again Philipp,

    After researching it this week I’ve come to the conclusion that Google Analytics’ default JS library can no longer be used to bypass ad blockers.

    The alternative would be to use the Minimal Analytics library included with CAOS. You can set it by changing the Tracking Code option on the Basic Settings tab. That should still be undetected by ad blockers with Stealth Mode enabled.

    Let me know how it goes!

    Thread Starter RockYourBlog

    (@rockyourblog)

    Hey,

    thanks for looking into the matter. I’ll give Minimal Analytics a try then.

    Cheers
    Philipp

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
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