Build an Ad Blocker With a Raspberry Pi to Stop Online Ads

Introduction

Online advertisements can be annoying and intrusive. I have decided to take matters into my own hands and build an ad blocker using a Raspberry Pi to stop ads from displaying on my devices. A Raspberry Pi is an inexpensive, credit-card sized computer that can function as a network gateway. By installing ad blocking software on the Raspberry Pi and routing my internet traffic through it, I can block online ads network-wide.

Building your own ad blocker with a Raspberry Pi is a great do-it-yourself project to improve your browsing experience. In this article, I will walk you through the entire process step-by-step.

What You'll Need

To build an ad blocking Raspberry Pi, you'll need the following:

A Raspberry Pi (any model will work, but Pi 3 or 4 recommended)
A MicroSD card (8GB Class 10 minimum)
A Power supply for the Pi
An Ethernet cable
A Case (optional, but recommended)

In addition, you'll need access to your home router to configure it to work with the Raspberry Pi. Having basic Linux and command line skills will be helpful as well.

Installing the Operating System

The first step is to install the Raspberry Pi OS on the microSD card.

To do this:

Download the latest Raspberry Pi OS from www.raspberrypi.org/downloads. Choose the 32-bit version.
Flash the OS image onto the microSD card using Etcher or other imaging software.
Insert the microSD card into the Pi and connect it to your router using the Ethernet cable.
Power on the Pi and allow the OS to boot up.

This will install a base Linux operating system that we can now customize with ad blocking software.

Configuring the Software

Next, we'll install and configure Pi-hole - an excellent open source ad blocking application for the Raspberry Pi.

Here are the steps:

Log into your Raspberry Pi remotely using SSH or a console cable.
Update the system with sudo apt update and sudo apt full-upgrade.
Install Pi-hole using this command:

curl -sSL https://install.pi-hole.net | bash

Follow the prompts to configure Pi-hole using the default options. Make sure to set a secure admin password.
Once installed, note the Pi's IP address (ip addr show). You'll need this later.

Pi-hole is now active and blocking ads for any device on your network by default. We just need to configure your router to take advantage of it.

Configuring Your Router

To leverage Pi-hole network-wide, you'll need to adjust some settings on your WiFi router:

Access your router admin page (usually 192.168.1.1 or similar).
Look for DHCP settings and change the DNS server assigned to clients to the IP of your Pi.
You may also need to disable any DNS resolver or caching features on the router.
Finally, you can block alternate DNS servers via firewall rules for extra security.

Once this is done, your router will funnel all DNS queries through Pi-hole allowing it to block ad requests.

Blocking Additional Domains

While Pi-hole comes pre-configured to block ads, you can easily add your own blacklisted domains:

Log into the Pi-hole admin console from a web browser.
Go to Settings > Blocklists and enter any domain names you want to block.
You can add any ads or tracking domains that get through the default filters.
Click "Save and Update" when finished.

Pi-hole will immediately start blocking any sites/servers you've blacklisted.

Wrapping Up

That's it! After following these steps, you'll have an efficient ad blocking Raspberry Pi protecting your entire home network. Online ads will be a thing of the past.

Some final tips:

Check Pi-hole's admin interface to monitor blocked queries and ads.
You can install Pi-hole on a cloud server for ad blocking anywhere.
Don't forget to back up your Pi-hole config in case the SD card gets corrupted.

Let me know if you have any other questions! I'm happy to help get your new ad blocking Raspberry Pi up and running.

“Build an Ad Blocker With a Raspberry Pi to Stop Online Ads”