Make apps think I watched an ad

[ehmaidan]

Hello everyone,

I was wondering if it was possible to make mobile applications (IOS specifically) think that I have actually watched the ad in order to receive rewards in games and such.

For example, to get free currency, I must watch an ad. But since ads are blocked, I am not able to. I do not want to whitelist the ad domain to actually watch the ad.

I was wondering if it was possible to make the app think that whenever it is supposed to show an ad, that I watched it (without the ad actually appearing) and get whatever rewards/incentives from watching thus ad.

Thank you for your time!

[jfb]

@ehmaidan

to get free currency, I must watch an ad. But since ads are blocked, I am not able to. I do not want to whitelist the ad domain to actually watch the ad.

I think you are going to have to either (1) watch the ad, or (2) live without the free currency.

@ehmaidan

if it was possible to make the app think that whenever it is supposed to show an ad, that I watched it (without the ad actually appearing) and get whatever rewards/incentives from watching thus ad.

Good question for an IOS forum. This is not something that Pi-hole can do for you.

[ehmaidan]

Thank you for taking your time and effort for replying.

I really hope someone in this forum with some knowledge concerning this topic can help out. Since most people in IOS forums probably know almost nothing about pihole.

My idea is instead of the pihole returning nothing (or whatever it returns instead of an ad), that it returns something which makes the device thinks that the ad has returned, when in reality it isn't an ad and you don't have to wait any time period for it to finish, like an ad does.

[jfb]

@ehmaidan

My idea is instead of the pihole returning nothing (or whatever it returns instead of an ad), that it returns something which makes the device thinks that the ad has returned, when in reality it isn't an ad and you don't have to wait any time period for it to finish, like an ad does.

As I noted, this is not something Pi-hole can do. Pi-hole filters at the domain level. It receives a request for a domain, and either blocks the domain and returns 0.0.0.0, or it resolves the domain name to an IP and returns the IP to the client. That's it.

Pi-hole does not see any of the content that is loaded after Pi-hole provides the IP, so it can't do what you are seeking.

[ehmaidan]

So if there is a way to host a domain which contains the code to make the apps (or even websites) think that the ad's domain is being returned, and this domain is returned instead of 0.0.0.0, then I guess it might work.

I really hope someone goes deep into it and tries to figure it out.

btw, thank you very much jfb for your help, you are awesome

[Jacobob]

I think from what I have observed, that the device has little to do with whether you get the reward or not. The ad sends a message to the game server enabling the reward.
You may have noticed that sometimes you sit through the ad and you don’t get the reward... this is due to a mixup between the ad server and the game server.

Unfortunately the only part of the process that is local to your network is the initial ad “offer”. So pi-hole can sink it or not. The rest is server side.

Tw I feel your frustration. The ads are getting longer and then force you to wait through a “mini game” that leads you to the App Store... bleh.