A study by PageFair and Adobe released in August estimates ad blocking will cost the global industry around US$41.4 billion dollars in 2016, up from the US$21.8 billion lost this year. And the onus of this revenue leak is increasingly being shifted onto publishers. So what are they doing to fight back against the ad-block threat?
Ad avoidance software provider Adblock Plus recently announced that it would be extending its service to mobile devices, leading Sarah Kavanagh, the acting chair of the IAB NZ Mobile Council, to raise a series of concerns about the increasing use of tools designed to dodge ads in the online space. And the extent of the issue on a local level has now been revealed, with Ben Williams, the spokesperson of Eyeo (parent company of Adblock Plus), saying that the company already has 200,000 active users in New Zealand. And, if international trends are anything to go by, then this is only set to increase over the next few years.