AdBlock Plus
AdBlock Plus is a free and open-source browser extension for content filtering and ad blocking, available on Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and other browsers. Originally created in 2006, it is one of the oldest and most widely installed ad blockers; eyeo reported over 100 million active installations in 2016.
Score generated by AI agents based on publicly cited evidence and reviewed by the project maintainer. Not independently validated. Last assessed 2026-10-01. Score revised 2026-10-01: 52 → 48.
Score History
Timeline events are AI-curated from public reporting. Score trajectory is derived from documented events.
Wladimir Palant released the rewritten Adblock Plus 0.6 for Firefox in January 2006 as an open-source hobby project. It blocked all ads without exception and had no company behind it, and it became the most popular Firefox add-on, passing 100 million downloads in 2010 and expanding to Chrome. There was no business model extracting from users.
eyeo GmbH was incorporated in autumn 2011, and in December Palant announced that Acceptable Ads would be allowed by default. Large companies paid for allowlisting while small sites were listed free, and by 2013 allegations of paid inclusion and reports that Google was paying showed the program was a business. The opt-out default set the pattern for everything after.
The Financial Times reported in February 2015 that Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Taboola paid to be allowlisted, with large entities giving up 30% of the added revenue. German publishers lost suit after suit, AdBlock switched on Acceptable Ads after a sale to an undisclosed buyer, and ABP passed 500 million downloads; together with AdBlock it held around 85% of ad-blocker users. Publisher anger went public, with the IAB's chief calling ABP an extortion racket.
eyeo launched the Acceptable Ads Platform in September 2016 to sell ads to ABP users directly; Google and AppNexus cut ties within a day. The Acceptable Ads Committee took over the criteria in 2017, co-founder Palant stepped back at the end of 2017, and the 2018 AAX exchange made programmatic sales permanent. Germany's top court upheld ad blocking and paid allowlisting in 2018, while ABP lost Firefox users to uBlock Origin, partnered with Microsoft's Edge mobile browsers and patched a 2019 filter flaw that let list maintainers run code on sites.
eyeo announced it had acquired AdBlock and combined the teams, holding the two best-known ad-blocking extensions. The Trestle DSP launched in August 2021, an ACM study showed the Acceptable Ads exception list unblocked trackers, and the Standard began admitting in-content ads. Palant sold his shares, leaving Tim Schumacher as majority owner, and former Google executive Frank Einecke replaced Till Faida as CEO in May 2022.
eyeo bought ad-recovery firm Blockthrough and merged it with AAX, so it now earned from blocking, allowlisting, exchange and recovery. A paid Premium tier launched in December 2022, the Standard widened to ad refresh and larger in-content ads, and eyeo began US federal lobbying in late 2023. YouTube's anti-adblock campaign and the Manifest V3 transition, which capped ABP at 50 active filter lists, put pressure on the core product.
Douglas de Jager became CEO in July 2025, cut 40% of staff and announced a strategic refounding around privacy-by-design advertising tools. Days later the Federal Court of Justice revived Axel Springer's copyright case, and in August YouTube broke site loading for ABP Chrome users. In 2026 ABP survived Chrome's final Manifest V2 shutdown and began blocking ads inside ChatGPT, but Acceptable Ads stayed on for 96% of users and the Acceptable Ads Committee moved to loosen ad-refresh rules after testing them on about 49.5 million ABP users.
Alternatives
Free, open-source ad blocker with no 'Acceptable Ads' program: it blocks all ads by default. Its developer's benchmarks show it using less memory than ABP. Easy switch: install the extension and uninstall ABP. The caveat is that the full version no longer runs on Chrome since Google removed Manifest V2 support; use it in Firefox, or the more limited uBlock Origin Lite on Chrome.
Free tracker blocker from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. More focused on blocking trackers than ads, so it complements a dedicated ad blocker. Easy to install alongside or instead of ABP with no configuration needed.
Commercial ad blocker with a fully functional free browser extension and paid desktop/mobile apps. No 'Acceptable Ads' whitelisting. Easy switch for the browser extension; paid apps offer system-wide blocking across all apps.
Dimensional Breakdown
Summaries below were written by AI agents based on the cited evidence. They are editorial interpretations, not independent research findings.
Dimension History
Timeline (70 events)
Wladimir Palant Releases Adblock Plus 0.6 for Firefox
Wladimir Palant released Adblock Plus 0.6 with a completely rewritten codebase as an open-source Firefox extension, after obtaining permission to reuse the 'Adblock Plus' name from previous developer Michael McDonald. The extension supported Firefox and other Mozilla-based browsers through Gecko's extension API.
Adblock Plus Reaches 100 Million Downloads on Firefox
Adblock Plus became the first browser add-on to reach 100 million downloads, with more than 12 million people using it every day, according to its announcement covered by TechCrunch. The press release described it as the most popular Firefox add-on. The achievement cemented ABP's position as the dominant ad-blocking tool.
Adblock Plus Launches Chrome Extension via AdThwart Acquisition
Adblock Plus acquired the existing AdThwart extension for Chrome and used it as a base to build Adblock Plus for Google Chrome, expanding beyond its Firefox origins to the rapidly growing Chrome browser. This move was critical for maintaining market share as Chrome overtook Firefox.
Palant, Faida, and Schumacher Incorporate eyeo GmbH
Wladimir Palant announced on September 30, 2011 that he and Till Faida had founded Eyeo GmbH a few weeks earlier, with formal registration confirmed the day before; their business partner (Tim Schumacher, founder of domain marketplace Sedo) backed the company. Based in Cologne, Germany, the company was set up to fund Adblock Plus development, transforming ABP from a hobby project into a commercial entity and setting the stage for the Acceptable Ads monetization model.
Acceptable Ads Program Announced with Default-On Whitelisting
Wladimir Palant announced that certain 'acceptable' ads would be whitelisted in upcoming ABP builds, enabled by default. Only static ads with a maximum of one script were permitted, with a preference for text-only content. The announcement generated immediate controversy on the ABP forums and Reddit, as users expected an ad blocker to block all ads, not selectively allow them through.
Adblock Plus Android App Launched on Google Play
Adblock Plus was released as an app for Android devices on the Google Play Store, expanding ABP's reach to mobile for the first time. The app allowed system-wide ad blocking on Android, though it required root access or proxy configuration for full functionality.
Anonymous Source Alleges ABP Offered Whitelisting for One-Third of Ad Revenue
An anonymous source accused Adblock Plus developer Wladimir Palant of offering to add a site's advertisements to the whitelist in exchange for one-third of the advertisement revenue. This was one of the first public allegations that ABP's Acceptable Ads program was a pay-to-play scheme rather than a quality standard.
Google Removes Adblock Plus from Play Store
Google began removing Adblock Plus and other ad-blocking apps (AdBlocker, AdAway, AdFree) from the Google Play Store on March 13, 2013, citing Section 4.4 of the Developer Distribution Agreement, which bars interfering with other services. Co-founder Till Faida called it a 'unilateral move' that threatened consumer choice, and the EFF called it censorship. ABP remained downloadable directly from its own website.
Google Search Ads Whitelisted in Acceptable Ads Program
Search ads on google.com and sites participating in Google's AdSense for Search program were whitelisted in June 2013, confirming that the world's largest advertising company was participating in the Acceptable Ads program. The Financial Times would later reveal that Google and other major companies were paying eyeo for this whitelisting.
German Blogger Calls ABP 'Mafia-Like Advertising Network'
Tech blogger Sascha Pallenberg published 'Adblock Plus Undercover' on Mobile Geeks, describing eyeo as a mafia-like advertising network. He alleged that partners could buy their way onto the Acceptable Ads whitelist, that ABP had ties to advertising-industry 'strategic partners', and that it promoted itself with fake reviews. Till Faida responded that much of the information about partner collaborations was correct but denied a conflict of interest. The report spread widely in German media.
TechCrunch Reports Google Pays ABP for Whitelisting
TechCrunch, picking up a Hacker News discussion, reported that Google appeared to be paying Adblock Plus to have its ads whitelisted through the default-on Acceptable Ads filter, while ABP openly acknowledged in its FAQ that it charged large companies for whitelisting. The report highlighted that the Acceptable Ads program was a revenue model, with ABP acting as a gatekeeper that well-funded companies could pay to get past.
Munich Court Signals Rejection of ProSieben, RTL and IP Deutschland Claims
During December 2014 proceedings in the suits brought by ProSiebenSat.1, RTL Interactive and IP Deutschland, the Munich Regional Court did not uphold their discrimination complaints: the judge found they had not shown that eyeo abused a dominant position toward media companies or that ABP misleads users.
Financial Times Exposes 30% Whitelisting Fee Structure
The Financial Times reported that Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Taboola were among companies paying to be whitelisted in Adblock Plus, and that companies pay 30% of the additional ad revenue they make from being unblocked. An eyeo spokesperson declined to name paying companies, citing contractual reasons, further fueling opacity concerns.
Die Zeit and Handelsblatt Lose Lawsuits Against eyeo
The Hamburg Regional Court rejected suits by Zeit Online and Handelsblatt seeking to ban the sale of Adblock Plus, concluding that ABP does not amount to an anti-competitive restriction of ad-financed online offers. The decision was the first of a string of German rulings upholding ad blocking.
Adblock Browser Launched for Android and iOS
Adblock Plus launched the Adblock Browser on both iOS and Android, marking its first dedicated mobile browser. The iOS launch was timed just days before Apple's iOS 9 release, which introduced content blocking APIs that enabled new competitors. Google allowed the browser app back on the Play Store after the 2013 removal of the extension.
Cologne Court Rejects Axel Springer's First Competition Suit Against eyeo
Axel Springer, publisher of Bild and Die Welt, lost its first lawsuit against eyeo in the Cologne Regional Court, eyeo's home town. Springer had argued the press had a constitutional right to advertise and then attacked the Acceptable Ads whitelist; the court ruled that ad blocking and Acceptable Ads were both legal. The case began what became a decade-long legal battle spanning competition law and copyright.
AdBlock Sold to Undisclosed Buyer, Switches On Acceptable Ads
Creator Michael Gundlach announced in an update to the AdBlock Chrome extension, ABP's largest rival, that he had sold it to an undisclosed company. The same update turned on Acceptable Ads by default; Gundlach said the new owner made that decision. The buyer was not named at the time, and eyeo only announced in April 2021 that it had acquired AdBlock.
Adblock Plus Passes 500 Million Downloads After Ten Years
Adblock Plus passed 500 million total downloads in January 2016, ten years after its initial release; the company had earlier cited 50 million active users. By May 2016 it announced 100 million active installations across desktop and mobile, establishing eyeo as the dominant force in the ad-blocking industry.
IAB CEO Calls ABP 'Unethical, Immoral, Mendacious Coven'
At the 2016 IAB Annual Leadership Meeting, Interactive Advertising Bureau CEO Randall Rothenberg called Adblock Plus an 'unethical, immoral, mendacious coven of techie wannabes' and 'an old-fashioned extortion racket, gussied up in the flowery but false language of contemporary consumerism.' He described ABP's business model as siphoning advertising dollars that should go to publishers.
Adblock Plus Launches Content Blocker for Samsung Internet
After Samsung's Internet browser added a content-blocking API for third-party apps in early 2016, Adblock Plus released 'Adblock Plus for Samsung Browser' in late January 2016 for devices running Android 6 (Marshmallow), with Acceptable Ads on by default. It gave ABP a route onto Samsung's default mobile browser, starting with the Galaxy S7.
Fifth German Court Rules Ad Blocking Is Legal
A Munich court ruled for the fifth time that using Adblock Plus to block ads is legal, defeating a lawsuit from Süddeutsche Zeitung. The court also found that the Acceptable Ads initiative, which requires larger companies to pay for whitelisting, is acceptable under German law and favorable to publishers because it gives them a way to monetize. eyeo had already won against Axel Springer, RTL Interactive, ProSiebenSat.1 and Zeit/Handelsblatt; appeals by RTL, ProSiebenSat.1 and Süddeutsche Zeitung failed in 2017.
Flattr Plus Partnership Launched for Publisher Micropayments
eyeo partnered with Flattr, cofounded by Pirate Bay's Peter Sunde, to create Flattr Plus, a service letting users automatically distribute monthly payments to web publishers based on engagement. Adblock Plus and Flattr would keep 10% of the proceeds. The partnership was framed as an alternative revenue model for publishers hit by ad blocking; Nieman Lab noted it also meant more money for Adblock Plus.
IAB CEO Labels ABP an 'Extortion-Based Business'
IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg doubled down on his criticism, calling Adblock Plus 'an extortion-based business' in remarks covered by TechCrunch. He stated that eyeo's model takes revenue publishers should earn and diverts it 'into their own pockets,' describing paid whitelists as fundamentally anti-publisher.
eyeo Launches Acceptable Ads Platform Ad Marketplace
eyeo launched the Acceptable Ads Platform (AAP) in partnership with ad-tech company ComboTag, a real-time bidding marketplace that would serve whitelisted ads to ABP users. Publishers were promised an 80% revenue share. The announcement marked eyeo's transition from a whitelisting gatekeeper to an active participant in programmatic ad selling.
MIT Technology Review: 'AdBlock Plus Wants to Make Money by Serving You More Ads'
MIT Technology Review published a critical analysis titled 'AdBlock Plus Wants to Make Money by Serving You More Ads,' highlighting the fundamental contradiction of an ad blocker entering the ad-selling business. The headline captured the growing public perception that eyeo had completed its transformation from consumer advocate to ad-tech company.
Google and AppNexus Disavow Acceptable Ads Platform Partnership
A day after the AAP announcement, Google moved to terminate ComboTag's AdX account and AppNexus cut ties. Google said it was 'surprised by the announcement' and that 'this is not a business we want to be part of'; its ads chief Sridhar Ramaswamy told reporters at DMEXCO, 'We were just as surprised as you were.' AppNexus said it would not work with a company so 'fundamentally harmful' to the ad business, saying Adblock Plus effectively sets up 'toll booths on a public road.'
Consumer Opinion Splits After ABP Launches Platform to 'Sell Ads'
Marketing Week reported that Adblock Plus split consumer opinion after launching its platform to sell ads, highlighting the tension between a tool installed to block ads and a company now selling ad inventory to its users.
Digiday Investigation Reveals NDA-Protected Whitelisting Process
Digiday's investigation into the ABP whitelist revealed that before publishers could discuss whitelisting terms, they had to sign nondisclosure agreements. The report found that ABP had shifted from public forum-based vetting of whitelist proposals to internal approval, with anyone at eyeo familiar with the guidelines able to make the final whitelisting decision.
eyeo Transfers Acceptable Ads Governance to Independent Committee
eyeo announced the first members of the Acceptable Ads Committee (AAC), a committee of the nonprofit Acceptable Ads Committee, Inc., with up to 11 seats representing nine member groups (eight seats filled at launch). The AAC took authority over the Acceptable Ads criteria, while eyeo continued to enforce them through its own whitelist and to charge large participants for access.
eyeo Acquires Micropayment Service Flattr
eyeo acquired Flattr, the micropayment service cofounded by Pirate Bay's Peter Sunde, for an undisclosed amount, after the two companies had worked together on Flattr Plus since May 2016. Flattr's team remained in Malmö, Sweden. Till Faida framed the acquisition as enabling 'hundreds of millions of users to choose how they want to pay for the content they consume,' and it deepened eyeo's control over alternative publisher monetization.
ABP Loses 6 Million Firefox Daily Users in One Year
Adblock Plus Firefox daily users dropped from 21.4 million on September 29, 2016 to 15.4 million on September 27, 2017, a loss of roughly 6 million users. Daily downloads fell from 181,000 to 89,000. gHacks noted that falling Firefox usage could explain part of the drop, but uBlock Origin's daily users rose from about 1.5 million to 4.1 million over the same period.
ABP 3.0 Rewritten for Firefox WebExtensions API
Adblock Plus 3.0 for Firefox was released as a WebExtension a week before Firefox 57 dropped support for legacy add-ons. gHacks listed regressions alongside improvements: the options page lacked functionality, the issue reporter collected less data, and the block-element tool offered less assistance. Palant later called the move 'damaging' for the extension's quality and reputation.
Co-Founder Wladimir Palant Announces Departure from ABP Development
After twelve years of working on Adblock Plus, co-founder and original developer Wladimir Palant announced he was 'taking a break' and would only get involved if his assistance was 'absolutely required.' He noted that two years earlier, Felix Dahlke had taken over the CTO role. Palant never returned to active ABP development, and the departure signaled a governance rupture at the company.
Berkeley Haas Case Study Questions ABP's 'Consumer Movement' Framing
The California Management Review published a case study titled 'Eyeo's Adblock Plus: Consumer Movement or Advertising Toll Booth?' analyzing eyeo's business model. The academic analysis examined whether ABP genuinely served user interests or primarily functioned as a rent-seeking intermediary that extracted value from both advertisers and publishers.
German Supreme Court Rules Ad Blocking and Whitelisting Are Legal
Germany's Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) dismissed Axel Springer's competition law case, overturning a 2016 Cologne appeals ruling that had partly favored Springer, and declared that ad blocking and eyeo's paid whitelist are both legal. Axel Springer called ad blocking 'an attack on the heart of the free media' and said it would take the case to the Constitutional Court.
Microsoft Edge Mobile Adds Ad Blocking Built on Adblock Plus
Microsoft updated Edge for Android (June 19) and iOS (June 21) with a built-in ad blocker based on eyeo's Adblock Plus technology, its first web ad blocker in any browser. eyeo confirmed a partnership but would not discuss financial terms. The blocker was off by default, and once enabled the iOS app told users they would see acceptable ads.
eyeo Launches Acceptable Ads Exchange (AAX) Programmatic Platform
eyeo launched the Acceptable Ads Exchange (AAX), its first programmatic ad technology for reaching ad-blocking audiences, after alpha testing since February 2018 with three DSPs. The AAX took a 20% cut of ad budgets, lower than the 30% direct whitelisting fee, and already reached 40 of the top 100 US websites at launch. This deepened eyeo's transformation into an ad-tech company.
eyeo Takes Part of 34% Stake in Download Portal Softonic
Softonic International sold a 34% stake to US investor Michael Levit and eyeo, according to Jones Day, which advised Softonic's shareholders. The deal tied eyeo to one of the largest software download portals.
Researcher Shows ABP $rewrite Filter Can Run Arbitrary Code
Security researcher Armin Sebastian showed that ABP's $rewrite filter option, added in version 3.2 in 2018, could let a malicious filter run code on sites such as Google Maps and Gmail that load scripts with an open redirect. eyeo announced it would remove the $rewrite option in a new release.
Axel Springer Files New Copyright-Based Lawsuit Against eyeo
After losing on competition law grounds, Axel Springer filed a new lawsuit arguing that Adblock Plus modifies website code in users' browsers, constituting copyright infringement. This novel legal theory shifted from market behavior to intellectual property, arguing that websites constitute protected computer programs under German copyright law.
eyeo Acquires Competitor AdBlock Inc. (Formerly BetaFish)
eyeo announced that, following its acquisition of AdBlock, Inc. (formerly BetaFish), the product teams behind Adblock Plus and AdBlock would combine from April 7, 2021, giving eyeo control over both widely used extensions. The products remained separate, and the combined teams' first new product was AdBlock VPN. The acquisition consolidated eyeo's dominance over the legacy ad-blocking extension market.
ACM Study Reveals Acceptable Ads Exception List Unblocks Trackers
A peer-reviewed study presented at the ACM Asia Conference on Computer and Communications Security found that ABP's Acceptable Ads exception list unblocked not only ads but also trackers otherwise blocked by EasyPrivacy. Of 42,210 Google-bound web requests originally blocked by EasyPrivacy, approximately 80% were unblocked by the exception list. Many unblocked requests enabled 1x1 tracking pixel images.
eyeo Launches Trestle DSP for Acceptable Ads Users
eyeo launched Trestle, a demand-side platform for buying ads shown to ad-filtering users who consent to Acceptable Ads. Initially US-only, Trestle let agencies onboard first-party data to target ad-blocking audiences and use verification services like DoubleVerify. eyeo said it earned more than $50 million from the Acceptable Ads program in 2020. Alongside its AAX exchange, Trestle extended eyeo's ad-tech stack to the buy side.
Hamburg Court Rules Ad Blocking Is Not Copyright Infringement
The Hamburg Regional Court dismissed Axel Springer's copyright lawsuit, ruling that Adblock Plus did not constitute unauthorized copying or modification of copyrighted software. The court found that processes carried out by ABP following local saving of a website do not constitute 'reworking' under copyright law, as only changes to program substance would qualify.
Acceptable Ads Standard Opens to In-Content Ads
After a survey of 9,076 ad-blocking users, the Acceptable Ads Committee added four in-content formats (static 728x90 and 840x150 ads between paragraphs, and two ads at the end of image galleries), ending the rule that acceptable ads must not interrupt the reading flow.
Co-Founder Palant Sells Shares, Schumacher Becomes Majority Owner
OMR reported that co-founder Wladimir Palant had left eyeo entirely and ceded his shares, leaving co-founder Tim Schumacher as majority owner. Schumacher said eyeo had 200 staff and annual revenue of 60 to 70 million euros and was looking at further acquisitions through a holding vehicle he fully owns.
Former Google Executive Frank Einecke Named eyeo CEO
Frank Einecke, formerly Managing Director of Global Marketing Partners at Google, replaced co-founder Till Faida as CEO. Faida moved to the board. The appointment of a senior Google advertising executive to lead an ad-blocking company underscored eyeo's strategic alignment with the advertising industry rather than consumer advocacy.
eyeo Deploys Machine Learning for Anti-Circumvention Ad Detection
eyeo deployed a machine learning solution to counter websites that circumvent ad blockers. eyeo said the models could detect ads it had never seen before that classic filter lists would miss, and were harder to circumvent; it described its Project Moonshot approach as never before done commercially.
eyeo Acquires Ad-Recovery Company Blockthrough
eyeo acquired Toronto-based Blockthrough, which helps publishers recover revenue lost to ad blocking by serving ads that comply with the Acceptable Ads Standard. All 50 Blockthrough employees joined eyeo's 250-person team. The acquisition created vertical integration: eyeo now profited from blocking ads (ABP), selling whitelisting (Acceptable Ads), running an ad exchange (AAX), and recovering blocked ad revenue (Blockthrough).
Adblock Plus Premium Launches as Paid Tier
eyeo launched Adblock Plus Premium for Chrome, Firefox and Edge, starting with a feature to block floating videos, newsletter pop-ups, survey requests and site notifications. It said cookie-notice blocking, an improved version of what the extension had previously offered, would follow as a Premium feature, while basic ad blocking would stay free.
Acceptable Ads Standard Allows In-View Ad Refresh
The Acceptable Ads Committee, saying the Standard was now the default ad experience for over 250 million users, began permitting in-view ad refresh on desktop: one side-rail unit, the same size, refreshing every 30 seconds or longer. The Standard had previously barred units that load new ads while the primary content stays the same.
eyeo Merges Blockthrough and AAX into Single Ad-Tech Unit
eyeo merged its Acceptable Ads Exchange (AAX) subsidiary with newly acquired Blockthrough into a single business unit under the Blockthrough brand. The merged entity combined AAX's programmatic exchange technology with Blockthrough's publisher-side ad-recovery tools, creating eyeo's unified ad-tech arm for monetizing ad-blocking users.
YouTube Begins Testing Anti-Adblock Detection Popups
YouTube started testing popups warning 'Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube' for some users running ad blockers, inviting them to subscribe to YouTube Premium instead. A YouTube spokesperson confirmed it was a small test. It marked the start of a sustained campaign against ad blockers including ABP.
Hamburg Higher Regional Court Upholds ABP Copyright Victory
The Hamburg Higher Regional Court rejected Axel Springer's appeal of the 2022 copyright ruling, holding that ad blocking does not interfere with program code and therefore does not constitute copyright infringement. The ruling preserved the legal precedent that browser extensions modifying rendered content do not violate copyright law.
YouTube Shows Anti-Adblock Wall to Adblock Plus Users
Adblock Plus acknowledged that YouTube was showing some ABP users an anti-ad-blocking wall that forced them to disable the extension to watch: sometimes after three videos, sometimes as a hard wall. ABP recommended keeping filter lists updated, using private browsing, or adding YouTube to the allowlist, conceding that the latter means allowing YouTube ads.
eyeo Registers AVOQ as US Federal Lobbyist
Lobbying firm AVOQ registered eyeo as a client on issues related to digital advertising, technology and privacy, later adding artificial intelligence. Reported lobbying income from eyeo was $20,000 for Q3 2023, $80,000 across 2024 and $200,000 in 2025.
Google Announces Manifest V3 Timeline to Deprecate MV2 Extensions
Google Chrome confirmed plans to begin disabling Manifest V2 extensions, which underpinned ABP's most capable ad-blocking functionality. MV3's declarativeNetRequest API limited extensions to predefined rule sets rather than dynamic script-based blocking, reducing ABP to 50 simultaneously active filter lists. The timeline set June 2024 for the start of MV2 deprecation.
Adblock Plus Releases Manifest V3 Version with Reduced Capabilities
Adblock Plus released its MV3 version for Chrome, implementing differential filter list updates as a workaround to Google's restrictions. The MV3 version limits users to 100 available filter lists and 50 simultaneously active. While eyeo claimed users 'likely won't notice a difference,' the architectural constraints objectively reduced ABP's blocking capability compared to MV2.
Chrome Begins Disabling Manifest V2 Extensions
Google began the MV2-to-MV3 transition by disabling Manifest V2 extensions in pre-stable Chrome channels (Dev, Canary, Beta) in Chrome 127 and later, as announced, with stable-channel rollout to follow. Users would see MV2 extensions automatically disabled, ending the more capable MV2 versions of ad blockers like ABP.
Acceptable Ads Committee Proposes Admitting 300x250 In-Content Ads
After industry complaints that the 2022 change excluded the 300x250 format, the AAC proposed raising the maximum height of in-content ads to 250 pixels, making 300x250 ads compliant, with a six-month probation period and a month of user feedback.
Acceptable Ads Committee Shifts to Principle-Based Standard
The AAC announced it would move from defining acceptable ads format by format to a principle-based approach that judges the overall ad experience, saying the format model could limit ad experiences users might accept in some contexts.
eyeo Cuts 40% of Workforce, Names Third CEO in Three Years
eyeo appointed Douglas de Jager (founder of spider.io, acquired by Google in 2014, and eyeo's CTO since late 2024) as CEO, replacing Frank Einecke after roughly three years. Simultaneously, the company cut its global headcount by 40%, with layoffs primarily affecting support staff; eyeo's LinkedIn page described a team of over 300 employees across 30 countries.
eyeo Announces 'Strategic Refounding' as Privacy Ad-Tech Company
New CEO Douglas de Jager announced a 'strategic refounding': eyeo would move from being chiefly a developer of ad-blocking products to building tools that make online advertising private by design, including blocking third-party tracking, cookie syncing and fingerprinting by default and privacy-safe ad measurement using differential privacy. The shift repositioned eyeo around advertising technology rather than ad blocking.
German Federal Court Revives Axel Springer Copyright Case
Germany's Federal Court of Justice (BGH) partially overturned the 2023 Hamburg ruling and referred the case back for further examination (decision of 31 July 2025, I ZR 131/23). The court found that the copyright status of browser-generated DOM and CSSOM trees needed closer analysis. The decision reopened the question of whether ad blocking could constitute copyright infringement under German law, with potential EU-wide implications.
YouTube Breaks Site Loading for Adblock Plus Chrome Users
On August 11, 2025, YouTube appeared to stop loading for users running the Adblock Plus Chrome extension; disabling ABP restored the site while incognito tabs worked. Tom's Guide (via Yahoo Tech) called it a quiet change targeting ABP and noted that uBlock Origin still worked, recommending it or YouTube Premium as alternatives.
FSFE Characterizes Springer Lawsuit as Assault on User Freedom
The Free Software Foundation Europe published a legal analysis characterizing Axel Springer's revived copyright lawsuit as an 'assault on user freedom.' The FSFE argued that if ad blocking were found to constitute copyright infringement, it would set a precedent threatening all browser extensions that modify how web content is rendered, fundamentally undermining user autonomy online.
eyeo Report: 96% of Ad-Filtering Users Keep Acceptable Ads On
eyeo's 2026 ad-blocking report estimated 1.1 billion ad-blocking users worldwide in Q4 2025 and more than 400 million Acceptable Ads users, with desktop users down 4% and mobile users up 42% since 2023. It said 96% of users have Acceptable Ads enabled, up from 94% in 2023.
ABP Keeps Working as Chrome Ends Manifest V2 Support
As Chrome 150 removed the last Manifest V2 support, disabling the full uBlock Origin, Adblock Plus said it had completed its MV3 transition ahead of Google's 2024 deadline and still works in Chrome. Its Chrome Web Store listing pitches it as an alternative to uBlock Origin.
eyeo Launches AI Block-o-Meter for Ads in Chatbots
eyeo said its filters had blocked ads inside AI assistants from the start and that, counting from late April 2026, Adblock Plus and AdBlock had blocked 16 million ads in ChatGPT; it launched a public dashboard tracking them, with Microsoft Copilot to follow.
AAC Proposes Looser Ad Refresh After Test on 49.5 Million ABP Users
In May 2026 about 49.5 million non-Premium Adblock Plus users were split into five groups of about 9.9 million to test looser ad-refresh rules. Finding no meaningful drop in uninstall, opt-out or issue-report signals and a 16.5% publisher revenue gain, the AAC preliminarily approved letting several in-view units refresh at any size outside the side rail, with feedback open until September 20, 2026.
Evidence (56 citations)
D1: User Value Erosion
D2: Business Customer Exploitation
D3: Shareholder Extraction
D4: Lock-in & Switching Costs
D5: Twiddling & Algorithmic Opacity
D6: Dark Patterns
D7: Advertising & Monetization Pressure
D8: Competitive Conduct
D9: Labor & Governance
D10: Regulatory & Legal Posture
Scoring Log (8 entries)
Checked 107 items + prose. 39 verified, 39 corrected (9 date-only), 29 re-sourced, 0 removed. Invented: (1) '60% less memory (500MB vs 320MB)' traces only to SEO listicles, not gorhill's benchmark page; (2) Adblock Tester review cited for 'YouTube failures' says ABP blocks YouTube ads; (3) lobbying '$50,000 in 2025' contradicted by LDA filings ($200,000); (4) 'High-Tech Gründerfonds among early investors' contradicted by Tech.eu 2014 (no institutional funding; HTGF backs a different Dutch 'eyeo'). Also fixed: eyeo founding date, $75M revenue (unsupported; €71.3M in 2022), 89% share (85%, ABP+AdBlock), Palant departure motive, Springer suit dates, YouTube 2025 event, several soft-404 eyeo URLs.
52→48. D1 7→6 (recalibration: blocking still tests well, 4.4 stars, 40M Chrome users; default-on ads, paywalled cookie blocking and update nags fit 6, not 'users routinely complain'/7), D2 7→6 (recalibration + correction: allowlisting is free for small/medium sites per ABP, so 'small publishers cannot afford fees' was wrong; dropped weakly sourced 'Google pays 1-2%'), D3 5→4 (recalibration: private, no buybacks; layoffs tied to pivot, not payouts), D7 7→6 (recalibration: allowed ads are static/limited; no 8-9 traits, ad load not dominant), D8 6→5 (recalibration: share below 30%, market competitive; acquisitions pattern fits 4-5), D10 1→2 (correction: lobbying $200k/yr since Oct 2023 registration, not $50k; standard industry lobbying). D4, D5, D6, D9 confirmed (D5 newly supported by May 2026 A/B test on 49.5M users; D6 by eyeo's 96% figure). Eras: current era re-dated 2026-02-28→2025-07-28 (de Jager CEO, 40% layoffs, refounding) and relabeled 'Layoffs and Pivot'→'Refounding and Layoffs'; 'Ad-Tech Pivot' (2016-09) and 'Founder Departure' (2017-12) merged at 2016-09-13 (Palant's step-back did not change the forces; AAP/AAX ad-selling ran through both); other eras re-dated to their events (2006-01-17, 2011-12-05, 2015-02-02, 2021-04-07, 2022-11-08). Since Oct 2025: eyeo 2026 report (96% keep Acceptable Ads on), Chrome's final MV2 shutdown (ABP unaffected, 40M Chrome users), AI Block-o-Meter (ChatGPT ads blocked), AAC ad-refresh loosening proposal after May 2026 test on ~49.5M ABP users (final decision pending after Sept 20), LDA lobbying $50k/quarter; Springer case still on remand. Trajectory worsening→stable: mixed 12 months (ad-refresh loosening proposed vs. ChatGPT ad blocking, user recovery); a final AAC approval would push it to worsening. Historical gap-fills: 2015 AdBlock sale, 2018 Edge partnership, 2019 Softonic stake and $rewrite flaw, 2022 in-content ads, Palant share exit, Premium launch, 2023 ad refresh, AVOQ registration, 2024 300x250, 2025 principle-based Standard.
No material changes since 2026-02-28. Checked eyeo/ABP news, Axel Springer copyright case (still pending on remand at Hamburg Higher Regional Court, no new ruling), Acceptable Ads status (unchanged, still default-on), leadership/layoffs (no changes since July 2025 pivot already in baseline), and pricing/product changes (minor cookie-banner blocking feature only). Chrome's mid-2026 MV2 shutdown is an industry-wide platform event affecting all Chrome ad blockers; ABP's MV3 limitations are already reflected in current scores.
Added 1 timeline event for D6 coverage gap in Era 1
Added 2 missing dimension narratives