Unable to watch Youtube video due to "Ad blockers violate YouTube's Terms of Service" banner

wengkitt10

I've been encountering an issue where I can't watch YouTube videos due to a banner saying "Ad blockers violate YouTube's Terms of Service." I have my tracker and ad blockers enabled, and I'm using Vivaldi Version 7.0.3495.26.

Has anyone else run into this problem? Is there a way to prevent this banner from appearing? Do I need to update my blocklist or add a new one? I'm currently using the default blocklist.

Any advice would be appreciated!

Pesala

@wengkitt10 It is a constant battle. I have used uBlock Origin for a long time now, without this problem. Disable Vivaldi’s ad-blocker for YouTube.

Catweazle

@wengkitt10, yes, this sometimes ocurres with the Vivaldi blocker, it works well, but sometimes is discovered by the anti adblocker.
A good workarround is to download this little script (few lines)¹ to a folder (don't delete it), open in Vivaldi the extension page in developer mode and drag this script on the page to install it as extension.
Now when you click on a YT link, open a Video in a new tab clicking on the miniature or reloading the page when the Video show this message, the video open in embedded mode standalone on the whole tab, without ads.
Enjoy

¹
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(To easy access my extension, I have put the page on the web panel)
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DoctorG

@wengkitt10 You can use the suggested to overcome the YT banner about ad blocker, but sometimes videos do not start correct or stop after a while.

Catweazle

@DoctorG, never had this issue, it only fails in some (few) videos which has desactivated the possibility to watch outside from YouTube.

Than the only possibility is to watch the video on desktop in the SMplayer opening its URL, this works in 99,99%

Copy the URL, open the SMplayer, Menu>Open>URL. The URL is already there taken from the clipboard Enter and watch the Video.

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wengkitt10

@Catweazle Thank you for the script! I really appreciate it.

wengkitt10

@Pesalais Vivaldi able to support MV2 extensions, or are you using the lite version?

Catweazle

@wengkitt10, Vivaldi support Mv2 until the shutdown next year, but the problem isn't that Vivaldi support it, when Mv2 extensions are not longer exist in the store.
Those which are still there you can use, even if they had the advice that they will disappear from the store until Jun next year,

greybeard

@Pesala @wengkitt10
And disable only trackers. They are more annoying and invasive. the ads are a pain but if there is a Mute button, use it or lower the volume.
I live with that. Not ideal I admit.

Stardust

Two words - uBlock Origin
And enjoy YouTube without ads!

scream22145

I got the same message today and after some testing with UBO and the browser's native ad blocker, I found the issue happening anyway whether:

I disabled UBO or the native blocker. But it works on other browsers with UBO.
It works in Vivaldi private mode with either of the blockers enabled.
Switching to another channel with both blockers enabled also works.
Removing YouTube's cache and cookies doesn't make a difference.

This got me nowhere, I can't make it work on my main account channel even with all ad blockers disabled. it's not the first time I encounter this issue anyway with Vivaldi as some websites always detect the ad blocker enabled even when I disable them all.

Pathduck

@scream22145 I use uBO, with only stock default lists enabled, and signed in all the time.

Never see ads, nor the TOS warning either.
So...

scream22145

@Pathduck ٍSame here and yeah it's good.
I'm just saying that Vivaldi's native ad blocker seems to not completely turn off when I need it to be completely disabled.

I encountered some websites which rely on their ads that keep showing the warning message to disable my ad blocker.

Some banking websites also keep asking me to enable popups for the websites even when I have it enabled for this website.

It's the only thing that irritates me with Vivaldi right now.

Pathduck

@scream22145 I don't use the Vivaldi Blocker since uBO works fine for now.

I strongly doubt the blocker is "not completely turned off" if disabled. Besides, that can easily be checked in Developer Tools > Network.
https://developer.chrome.com/docs/devtools/network

I suspect you might just be misunderstanding something or possibly you have another blocker extension running that triggers these alerts from sites.

It might be a simple case of just clearing browser cache after disabling the blocker, or even simpler do a hard reload with Ctrl+F5.

scream22145

@Pathduck Yeah it has to be something else cause it doesn't make sense.
I already tried the hard reload multiple times, Disabled the native blocker for all and kept the UBO for now.

I guess I'll need to learn how to use the Dev tools somehow to get where the issue is.

Thanks for the help though.

Pathduck

@scream22145 Sure - If you have an example site where is happens all the time, and reliable reproduction steps, I'd be happy to test. But I'm not going to test something that only happens "sometimes".

in Devtools, just open the Network tab, reload the page. If you see any requests with a status of "blocked" or similar red failing then something is blocking the request from completing. Or it just fails for other reasons unrelated to blocking.

Note: You might see "ping" requests failing but that's a different issue as vivaldi blocks those by default.

Stardust

@scream22145 said in Unable to watch Youtube video due to "Ad blockers violate YouTube's Terms of Service" banner:

I got the same message today and after some testing with UBO and the browser's native ad blocker, I found the issue happening anyway whether:

It's not recommended to use/enable another ad blocker, when you use uBO (from uBO docs) so keep internal Vivaldi blocker disabled.

scream22145

Yeah thank you, I'll stick to UBO from now on.

scream22145

@Pathduck i don't have any of the websites that keep giving the ad warning message but when I do it's consistent not only sometimes. But I won't worry about that I just wish to solve the issue with YT for now.

I checked as you instructed and I see a lot is getting blocked. i don't understand anything though

But I see there's a script related to ads... i think

and this is the info I get when I click on it (If useful at all)

Pathduck

@scream22145 If you get a status of blocked:other it means that something is blocking - kind of obvious

SO that something could be:

Vivaldi's blocker
uBlock Origin
Any other adblocker or privacy-related extension

Are you absolutely, 100% positive the Vivaldi adblocker is disabled, and also that uBO is disabled?

Make a screenshot, showing the full address bar including the Vivaldi blocker icon and uBO showing it's been disabled on YT.

To make sure, just disable ALL your extensions, close all tabs, clear cache+cookies, restart the browser and try again.