Quite a few VPN apps bundle in some form of ad blocking or antimalware features, which are nice perks, but there’s usually a catch: You often don’t get to decide which sites are blocked. Instead, your provider maintains an internal blocklist, and you choose whether to enable it. If the blocklist is cutting off access to a resource you actually need, most of the time you’ve got no option but to turn off your whole VPN ad blocker, if only temporarily.
Windscribe’s ROBERT works a little differently, providing more flexibility over what you do and don’t block. Instead of a single on/off toggle, ROBERT offers several categories of content to block or allow. You can also layer your own custom rules on top, blocking or allowing any domain you like. Once you’ve set up your custom rules, ROBERT applies instantly across your whole Windscribe account.
Learn all about Windscribe’s nifty ROBERT ad blocker, from how it works to how to use it.
What makes ROBERT different from a regular ad blocker?
Screenshot by CNETA regular ad blocker works inside your browser, inspecting the page as it loads and preventing ad elements from being loaded into your page, either by stopping the request to load that ad or removing the web page element that contains an ad.
Browser-level ad blockers tend to be quite effective but can consume significant resources on your machine, such as RAM, as they need to inspect every single tab in your browser every time one loads. They also only work on the browser you install one on. For laptops and desktops, that’s fine, but not so much for smart TVs or game consoles.
There’s also Domain Name System, or DNS-level ad blocking, which stops ads directly at the source. The Domain Name System translates web addresses, such as CNET.com, into numerical addresses that machines can read, such as 199.240.199.200. Instead of blocking ads from being loaded after a request has been made, a DNS ad blocker stops the internet traffic from requesting that ad in the first place.
When a DNS ad blocker is running, it doesn’t matter which piece of software on your device makes the request. Whether it’s your browser or an app, the DNS ad blocker will try to stop the request before it ever loads the ad to your device.
VPN providers offer both browser-based and DNS-based ad-blocking solutions, but often you have no control over which sites are actually blocked on the DNS side. If a site you need to access is in a VPN provider’s block list, you can either turn off your ad-blocking protection or request that the provider remove the site from its server-side block list.
But Windscribe’s ROBERT gives you far more control over how you block entire categories of internet sites, and allows you to specify your own sites to block or unblock.
How does DNS blocking work?
Screenshot by CNETEvery website you visit has a numeric IP address, such as 199.300.400.500, which is translated to something humans can read, like CNET.com. IP addresses are used by networking software to direct internet traffic, but they’re not particularly useful if you’re trying to remember a site off the top of your head. We use domains instead of IP addresses; it’s far easier to remember CNET.com than a string of random numbers.
The Domain Name System, or DNS, is an internet-wide system that translates domains into IP addresses. Whenever you visit a website, your device queries the nearest DNS resolver for the IP address associated with that domain, which is called a DNS request.
If a DNS resolver doesn’t know the IP address, it asks a more authoritative DNS resolver further up the chain until a DNS server responds with the IP associated with that URL. So, the DNS lets us remember human-readable names for websites (dot com, dot org, dot edu and other easy-to-read addresses) without having to worry about the underlying networking tech.
DNS-based blocking intercepts DNS requests. When you’re connected to Windscribe, your DNS requests are routed through the VPN tunnel to Windscribe’s own internal DNS resolvers instead of public ones, like those of your internet provider, or ones maintained by companies such as Google or Cloudflare. These DNS servers are also running ROBERT. When ROBERT is active, it checks the requested domain against the block lists you’ve enabled and any custom rules in place.
If the domain you’ve requested matches one that’s on the ROBERT block list, it refuses to resolve the domain request. Therefore, the device you’re using can’t find an IP associated with the domain and just drops the request.
Because this happens at the server level, all DNS blocking occurs before any traffic reaches your device, so there’s no opportunity for a malicious domain to access your device.
What does ROBERT actually block?
Screenshot by CNETROBERT blocks ads, trackers and malicious domains by default, plus a set of optional content categories you can switch on as needed. ROBERT organizes the bulk of this into premade block lists, each bundling several community-maintained lists together with Windscribe’s own curated whitelists to theoretically reduce false positives.
If that isn’t enough, ROBERT also gives you the ability to curate your own custom rules:
- Malware: This list targets sites known to distribute malware, launch phishing attacks or act as botnet command-and-control servers (which could hijack your device and use it for a cyber attack). There’s effectively no reason to ever turn this off unless you need to access these sites to conduct research.
- Ads and trackers: Windscribe describes this as one of the most comprehensive ad and tracker lists available, hand-curated to remove the false positives that plague many community lists. Blocking ads and trackers also has the added benefit of speeding up page loading and lowering data usage on mobile devices.
- Social networks: In addition to blocking social platforms outright, this category also blocks the trackers that follow you around the web, even when you’re not on the social site itself. If you still want to use one network, you can allow it while blocking the rest. As well as being handy for preserving your privacy, this works well for keeping family devices off of social media networks.
- Adult sites: This category blocks sexually explicit content. Like the social networks category, it’s quite effective if you’re using Windscribe for family safety without needing to buy a full device management solution, such as antivirus software with parental controls.
- Gambling: Blocks gambling and betting sites. Betting advertisements are prolific across the internet, so it might be quite useful if you’re trying to cut down on your gambling and don’t want to see anything that could tempt you back into it, or you simply want to avoid these ads altogether.
- Fake News and clickbait: Targets sites that intentionally publish hoaxes and disinformation, along with clickbait farms.
- Competitors (other VPNs): This might be the least useful category, but at least Windscribe gives you the option to turn it off. It blocks other VPN companies’ domains, on the logic that many of them run ad and tracking networks of their own, but in practice, this is likely to cause more problems than it solves.
- Crypto: Blocks cryptocurrency exchanges, crypto news sites and in-browser cryptominers that hijack your device’s processor to mine coins. It’s particularly useful if you’re working on a device with a smaller CPU that will come under extreme strain if it encounters a crypto-mining site, which harnesses your machine’s processing power to mine cryptocurrencies.
Here’s how to use Windscribe’s ROBERT
To enable or disable a category, head to the “Preferences” menu in your Windscribe app and look for the “ROBERT” tab. Then you’re given a set of on/off sliders for each category.
On top of the categories, ROBERT lets you write your own rules, which you can find by logging into your “My Account” page on the Windscribe site and going to the “ROBERT” section in the “Account Overview” page.
You add a new rule by entering the domain name or IP of the site you wish to cover with a custom rule, then select whether to “Block”, “Whitelist” or “Spoof.” Any rules you add can be instantly applied to all your devices.
Block rules let you blacklist any specific site that isn’t already covered. If there’s a particular sketchy service you don’t trust that keeps popping up in your network logs, ROBERT allows you to blacklist either the domain or IP from Windscribe’s web portal.
Whitelist rules do the opposite. They force a domain to resolve even if a category would otherwise block it. If enabling the social networks list breaks a login button that relies on a social media site sign-in, you can exempt that one domain and everything else keeps working.
The “Spoof” option lets you assign a custom IP to any domain you set up with a rule. This is useful if you’re trying to forward traffic from a specific domain to a server you control, either for traffic analysis or to capture access attempts.
ROBERT is free to use, but you get more out of paid plans
The good news is that ROBERT is available to everyone, including free Windscribe users. The difference between tiers comes down to how many block lists you can use and how many custom access rules you’re allowed.
The free tier gets you the malware and ads and trackers lists, plus three custom rules. That covers the absolute basics, but most VPN services offer a similar DNS solution just for blocking malware and ads.
The Build A Plan unlocks the remaining categories we’ve outlined above and raises your custom rule limit to 10. For families and content filtering, this is the plan you’ll need, although the custom rule limit is still a little low.
The Pro plan offers the same full set of categories as Build A Plan, but raises the custom rules to 1,000. Unless you’re maintaining an extensive personal blocklist or running fine-grained filtering across many domains, it’s unlikely you’ll ever reach the top end of the Pro plan.
Windscribe is an excellent VPN and ad content blocker
ROBERT is one of the best DNS blocking tools I’ve seen on a VPN. I’m not aware of many other VPNs that offer access to both a wide set of premade categories and the ability to build your own custom block and allowlist rules. While the pricing plans mean you won’t really be able to get the full use out of ROBERT without buying the most expensive tier, it’s worth it if you’re going to take the time to fine-tune your VPN to fit your needs across all of your devices.
Once you take the time to build your own ROBERT ruleset, it’s clear how useful it can be. Managing your family devices is so much easier if you can lock down social media and gambling sites without touching the devices themselves. ROBERT can also upgrade your privacy by shutting off trackers and social network surveillance everywhere at once, while still giving you the flexibility to unblock the sites you want to access. You can also block ads at the source and protect your devices from malware and phishing before a bad domain ever resolves. Most VPN blockers ask you to trust their list and live with it, but ROBERT puts control over your connection directly in your hands.
For more, learn why your online footprint is probably too big and how to reduce it.
