While obnoxious advertising is something many people will have come across when browsing around the web, Google has been taking a concerted effort to fight bad ads across its widepsread ad network.
Throughout 2015, Google blocked a whopping 780 million ads from its ad network for violating the company's strict policies. All up, Google has over 1,000 people in a team dedicated to combatting crappy ads, which work alongside sophisticated technology to improve the ad experience for all.
Of the 780 million ads Google banned, most were for the sort of crap you don't want to see: counterfeit products; dodgy, misleading or unapproved pharmaceuticals; weight loss scams; phishing; malware and other unwanted software; and 'trick to click' ads that are designed to look like system errors or other prompts.
Google has also developed technology to improve the mobile ad experience. The company disabled ads on 25,000 mobile apps due to the developers ignoring Google's ad guidelines, and rejected over 1.4 million ad applications for the same reasons. Technology is also in place to prevent users on mobile devices from accidentally clicking on ads.
The fight against bad ads will continue in 2016, with Google looking into ways to further restrict "what can be advertised as effective for weight loss" and prevent even more malware and bots. User feedback does help Google improve the ad experience, as does changing your ad settings through this control panel.