They call it “dark traffic” - ads that are not seen by tech-savvy users who have excellent ad blockers.
Not surprised that its growing. The web is unusable without an ad blocker and its only getting worse, and will continue to get worse every month.
When the first banner ad appeared on the web, the condemnation was not loud enough and it was allowed to fester.
At this points these entities have become large enough that the evil practice that could have been snuffed out, is now being accepted.
Now every slimey thing on the internet is due for the mother of all crackdowns. Something like the GDPR times 911.
I’m not in the mood for centrist technocratic measured solution at the moment.
If it makes more than a million a year and it’s using any kind of psychological tactics,
that’s advertising, sponsored search, dark patterns, then BURN IT ALL DOWN