I recently noticed that the Google ads embedded in my blog were no longer loading properly. To make sure the problem was not caused by my own site, I visited several websites carrying Google ads from both the office and home. The ads failed to display there as well.
The exact result varied between browsers. Some showed a message like:
googleads.g.doubleclick.net 拒绝了我们的连接请求。
Others displayed:
网页无法打开
位于 https://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/xxx 的网页无法加载，因为：
net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED
Google withdrew from China more than a decade ago. At first, some services such as Google Maps and Google Translate remained usable. Maps later became inaccessible, and Google Translate also stopped working this year. For a long time, Google’s advertising service seemed to be one of the few Google services that could still be accessed normally. Now that the ads are failing too, it feels as if Google has finally disappeared from everyday internet use here.
For small website owners, this is not a trivial loss. There are not many realistic ways for a small site to generate income, and joining an advertising network is one of the simplest and most practical options. Domestic advertising networks generally require an ICP filing, while the quality and reliability of the available services vary widely. Some operators have even disappeared before publishers could withdraw their earnings. Google’s advertising program, by comparison, was one of the few networks with broad recognition and a relatively established reputation.
Even bloggers who do not run their sites primarily for profit still have to pay for hosting and domain registration every year. Advertising revenue may not amount to much, but it can at least offset part of those expenses. Without Google ads, many personal blogs may eventually have no choice but to keep operating purely out of personal interest.
Update: November 18
A local ping test for googleads.g.doubleclick.net returned 127.0.0.1. I then checked the domain with online ping tools and found that only Guangdong returned 127.0.0.1; in most other parts of the country, the domain resolved normally. This suggests that Google ads were affected by DNS pollution only in certain regions, rather than being inaccessible nationwide.
There is little an ordinary user can do about the polluted DNS result for googleads.g.doubleclick.net other than wait for the restriction to be lifted. If you are in an affected area and simply want to view Google ads yourself, there are workarounds.
On a PC, you can modify the hosts file and enter the correct IP address. On an Android phone, changing the hosts file is more complicated, but you can enable Encrypted DNS—called Private DNS on some devices—and enter dns.google as the specified DNS provider. dot.360.cn, dns.pub, and dns.alidns.com are also available as alternatives.
This solution only allows the person who changes the DNS settings to see the ads. It does not restore ad visibility for other visitors to the site.