Regression of #239: Branch blocked by EasyPrivacy / EasyList

[SleeplessByte]

Affects anyone with default settings on Adblock Plus, AdBlock, uBlock Origin or uBlock, among other blockers who include this list, which is also available for IE9+.

Static filter ||branch.io^$third-party found in:
EasyPrivacy

Easy Privacy blocks Branch by default, with no fallback's in the default web integration script (thus silently failing).

Additionally, when this is allowed,

Static filter ||app.link^$third-party found in:
EasyPrivacy

This however results (correctly) in an error in the branch script loaded, so the end-user can be notified / redirected.

Please note that calls to text me the app endpoints silently fails because of similar issues.

[rubinsingh]

@SleeplessByte thank you so much for re-reporting this issue. I've escalated it to the appropriate team and we'll try our best to get ourselves removed from the list.

[SleeplessByte]

I also suggest amending the snippet so consumers can tap into "what if branch is blocked".

[SleeplessByte]

Relevant forum posts:

https://forums.lanik.us/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=26773&p=81196&hilit=branch.io#p81196
https://forums.lanik.us/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=36881&p=118601&hilit=branch.io#p118601
https://forums.lanik.us/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=27958&p=84939&hilit=branch.io#p84939

Perhaps you should support a non-tracking fallback and have them accept thát. Or something similar.

https://pagefair.com/blog/2017/adblockreport/
https://www.quantable.com/analytics/how-many-users-block-google-analytics/

If everyone using default settings, this is being blocked at least 100M+ users ABP, 40M+ AB, 14.2M+ uBlock, or 11+% of all users of the interwebs.

[fantapop]

Any updates on this?

[csalmi-branch]

Thanks for poking on this issue again! We are still working to get removed from that list, and will continue to follow-up.

[taina0407]

Another way to avoid this may be is that branch.io allow customer to use custom domain name for their own cdn servers to serve js files instead of loading direct from cdn.branch.io domain - which is easily blocked by adblocker

[nathanshelly]

@csalmi-branch given that Branch has been trying to remove itself from that list for multiple years now what options do we have in the meantime?

I'm specifically interested in sending users an SMS which I am unable to do through the SDK when an adblocker is active. A potential fallback for me would be an API endpoint to send an SMS since I could make a request to my own backend which could then forward that request on to a Branch SMS endpoint. As far as I can tell Branch has no such endpoint [1][2]. Is there such an endpoint that I could hit?

Short of that is there some other fallback I can use?

[1] https://docs.branch.io/apps/deep-linking-api/
[2] https://github.com/BranchMetrics/branch-deep-linking-public-api

[skizzo]

Hard to believe that this issue is still open, since it renders branch.io absolutely unusable for the web.. Did anybody find a solution that doesn't involve having to ask page visitors to disable their ad blocker?

[antoniohof]

Any updates on this?

[tarrouye]

3 years later... Still an issue...

Can anyone from Branch please give an update on this?

I find it a bit ridiculous that there is no official solution to this yet, or at least a recommendation on how to handle the edge-case... Ad-blockers are extremely common in today's world, it's not acceptable for the entire flow to break from the presence of one.

[girdhariag]

Did we get any updates on this yet?

[danielithomas]

Hi confirming that we are experiencing the same problem with Ad Blockers and Security Policies for users of our app. It is also possible to get the same blocking simply by using Edge (Chromium based) in 'strict' mode. E.g. Some enterprise IT Depts. will put user browsers into that state by policy.

If there was a way (as posted above a long time ago) to have the branch-latest.min.js to come from our subdomains rather than branch itself, this might help.