Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf (2022) (ericdraken.com)

Article summary

The article describes a method to block YouTube ads on Apple TV by decrypting and stripping ads from Protocol Buffers. This is achieved by setting up a man-in-the-middle proxy and exploiting a flaw in YouTube's implementation of a Protobuf feature. The author also discusses the importance of blocking malicious ads and behavior tracking, and provides a guide on setting up a bare-metal network router to protect all networked devices. The method involves using a mini PC with a cryptographic instruction set and installing pfSense, a free and open-source firewall and router distribution.

Main themes

• Ad blocking
• Network security
• Protocol Buffers
• Man-in-the-middle proxy
• pfSense
• YouTube ads

What commenters say

• Adding a custom CA to an Apple TV's certificate store allows for man-in-the-middle decryption of HTTPS traffic, which is unexpected but possible.
• Certificate pinning is still commonly used in mobile apps, particularly in banking and finance, to prevent MITM attacks.
• Some argue that Google could easily block the ad-blocking method by checking the CA that signed their SSL certificate, but they have not done so yet.
• YouTube could potentially embed ads directly into the video stream, but this would be computationally intensive and may not be feasible.
• The use of server-side ad insertion is not uncommon in premium streaming video, but YouTube has not implemented this due to increased server and bandwidth costs.
• Paying for YouTube Premium does provide some support to content creators, but the amount is negligible compared to other methods like Patreon.
• Blocking YouTube ads can still provide value to creators through view counts and algorithm boosts, and some creators also earn money through sponsored segments.
• The effectiveness of ad-blocking methods can be limited by the use of certificate transparency and other security measures.