OK GOOGLE, get rid of bad ads. The tech giant has announced that it will introduce its own ad blocker to the Chrome browser next year to remove the most intrusive ads. It will also let websites remove ads for people who pay to go ad-free.
Many people, including a quarter of UK adults, use ad-blocking software. But Google hopes that blocking the worst offenders itself will encourage people to put up with the rest. The company makes 86 per cent of its revenue from advertising, so has a large stake in making sure most adverts get through.
Chrome will block pop-ups, autoplaying video ads with sound, and ads shown before a page opens, among others. 鈥淚t鈥檚 far too common that people encounter annoying, intrusive ads on the web ,鈥� wrote Sridhar Ramaswamy, Google鈥檚 senior vice-president for ads and commerce in a blog post. 鈥淭hese frustrating experiences can lead some people to block all ads.鈥�
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Starting first in North America, the UK, Germany, Australia and New Zealand, people using Chrome will have a choice: put up with ads that meet Google鈥檚 standards or pay a small fee to publishers, which includes a cut for Google, to browse ad-free.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淏locked by Google鈥�
