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DESCRIPTION

BFilter is a filtering web proxy. It was originally intended for removing banner ads only, but since then its capabilities have been greatly extended.

Unlike most of the similar tools, it doesn't rely on blacklists (although it does support them). The problem with blacklists is that advertisers are always one step ahead. You see an ad slip through, you update your blacklist, and in case it didn't help, you add a new entry yourself. Once I got tired of that, I decided to write a proxy that would detect ads heuristically, much like modern anti-virus software manages to detect many viruses unknown to it.

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WHAT'S NEW
Version 1.1.4:
  • Youtube works again.
  • Bypass mode now correctly disables the blocklist.
  • Fixed a crash on "disk full" condition.
  • The heuristic analizer was improved.
  • The JavaScript engine was updated.
  • Some new experimental filters where added.
  • Minor UI improvements.
REQUIREMENTS
Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later.

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Developer:Joseph Artsimovich
Downloads:9,680
  - Version d/l:1,542
Internet:Internet Utilities
License:Free
Date:07 Jun 2008
Platform:PPC/Intel
RATING
*****
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BFilter User Reviews (16 posts)Write A Review
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Jul 12 2008

PITUPOLCHANA  Cool Soft.. ever  
(Version 1.1.4)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jun 9 2008
*****

PLANETENPAULTJE  I was getting significantly pissed-off by the Google ads on the MU site. While I was wondering how to block them in Saft and PithHelmet when I saw BFilter passing by. I installed it and *all* ads are now stripped. Some sites are mangled in the process, but not many. Most excellent stuff this.  
(Version 1.1.4)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Oct 17 2007
*****

LEE123  its the best. no more annoying animated gifs. life is great, thank you  
(Version 1.1.2)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jul 30 2007
*****

MUTZ  I have this baby installed for a while now and it works flawlessly without screwing up the layout of your add-free webpages...

and it's free...

kudos to the developers  
(Version 1.1)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jul 8 2007
****.

KOMBI64  Features: works right out of the box, kills ads and junk scripts with The Gread Heuristic Lightsaber, configures Mac's newtwork preferences automatically, doesn't need blacklist updating, and the ad-removal is configurable. Love it.   
(Version 1.0.9)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jul 8 2007

KOMBI64  Ad-blocking is sweet, but forwarding is obscure.

Aside from forwarding issues: the app seems like an optimal ad-filtering solution - heuristic analysis, my God!, someone had finally implemented in ad-blocking... and flash-filtering!

1) I have my TOR running, occasionally I use some HTTP proxies, and I decided to configure them both into one proxy-chain and see what happens then.

2) Here's my setup:

Browser -> bfilter HTTP proxy (127.0.0.1:8080) -> TOR SOCKS4 proxy (127.0.0.1:9050) -> some HTTP proxy -> Internet.

Now I point Firefox' HTTP proxy to 127.0.0.1:8080, ads are filtered out, if it point it to 8118 (TOR), my identity is masked, but not both. :)

3) Here's my forwarding.xml (which doesn't work):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<forwarding>

<option name="foo" selected="selected">

<proxy-chain>

<proxy>

<type>socks4</type>

<host>127.0.0.1</host>

<port>9050</port>

</proxy>

<proxy>

<type>http</type>

<host>ip address goes here</host>

<port>port goes here</port>

</proxy>

</proxy-chain>

</option>

</forwarding>

4) I've searched web thoroughly, read all the available docs and forum discussions, but haven't figured out what am I doing wrong.

Hope it can be fixed.  
(Version 1.0.9)

praisebury
0
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
Jul 29 2007

JART  Sorry for the late response. It seems there is no way to get notifications when a comment is posted.

About your problem: the scenario you describe doesn't require messing with config files. Just create a network location for Tor, specify localhost:9050 as SOCKS proxy, and make sure it works. Then you just re-install BFilter and it will create a "(BF) Tor" location, which will work as you want:

Browser -> BFilter -> Tor -> Internet.

Editing the forwarding.xml file is only necessary if you want to have more than one chain between BFilter and the Internet.

Note that on OSX, an entry in forwarding.xml overrides a network location of the same name. But again, you don't need modifying forwarding.xml for your scenario to work.  
(Version 1.0.9)

praisebury
0

Nov 11 2006
*****

APPLECRYPT MODS  works perfectly. EXCELLENT!!  
(Version 1.0.6)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Sep 5 2006

HEAVY_SHOWER  quote: New option to remove ads completely, as opposed to subsituting them with a clickable replacement image.

How does one access the "option" to remove ads completely?  
(Version 1.0.6)

praisebury
0
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
Sep 5 2006

JART  Because the Mac version doesn't have a GUI, it's a little tricky. You have to edit the following file:

/Library/Application Support/BFilter/config

and add "page_cleanup = safe" (without quotes) somewhere after "ad_border = none". If you didn't have an earlier version installed, then you edit the option, not add it.

The possible values are "off", "safe" and "maximum".

They are documented here:

http://svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/bfilter/trunk/bfilter/conf/config.default?view=markup

Finally, you have to restart BFilter. Either just reboot, or issue this command from the terminal:

sudo /Library/StartupItems/BFilter/BFilter restart  
(Version 1.0.6)

praisebury
+1

Jul 25 2006
*****

MOK.IN.TOUCH™  It's working perfectly. Great stuff.  
(Version 1.0.5)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jul 24 2006
*****

MU5TI  Works as advertised.

If you want to tweak the rules, head to

/Library/Application Support/BFilter

after reading the forums and documentation.

The most beautiful part of this is the Network Locations are added by the installer, so if something is not working as it should, you can go back to your original Network Location.  
(Version 1.0.5)

praisebury
0
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