"Blob" on Facebook

[David DeBord]

Greetings Ya'll,

This is my 1st post in the forum.

I've had several problems with Facebook, Freeze ups etc., & I quickly learned that No Script can eliminate these problems by stopping Facebook, & several of it's "affiliates" from operating for a few seconds, by turning them off temporarily with NoScript.

One of these "Scripts" that I am concerned about, is identified as "Blob". It shows up in NoScript faded out, INFREQUENTLY. When this happens, then Facebook becomes totally Unresponsive. NoScript has no control over it, & the only way that I can get rid of it is to shut down Facebook.

Has anybody had this problem?

[barbaz]

Greetings Ya'll,

This is my 1st post in the forum.

Welcome to the InformAction forums.

One of these "Scripts" that I am concerned about, is identified as "Blob". It shows up in NoScript faded out,

That means that it's on the "mandatory" whitelist, the purpose of which is for making sure the browser itself isn't blocked and for whitelisting schemes which if there's something from there it's generated by a script you *already* allowed. Blocking these is either harmful or useless.
I can't imagine that this is the cause of the hang (correlation does not imply causation).

If you completely disable NoScript (Tools > Add-ons Manager > NoScript > Disable > Yes, remove ALL protections), does the problem occur?
If not, when it happens, do you see anything related in the Browser Console? (Ctrl-Shift-J)
(if you don't know what's related, turn off CSS warnings and post everything else you see)

[David DeBord]

barbazz,

My Apologies for taking so long to reply to your comments. In Truth, the only way that I found out about your "reply", was that I was doing a web search, to learn about this "blob". Lol! I just noticed that the "Notifications", was not checked, so again, My Aoplogies.

"That means that it's on the "mandatory" whitelist", Then why doesn't it show up constantly in Noscript? And, if it's "Mandatory" what is it, & are it's sources?

"Blob" is strange, .... It does not always appear, it's always faded out, it dims when clicked on, it has no "icon" next to it, nor does it always stay in the Noscript list for the full duration of the time while on Facebook.

As far as the Freeze-ups, &/or No Response?

I've learned that turning "akamihd.net" off & then on, causes Facebook to properly respond. This problem is spoken of by many people in several Facebook help groups.

I can not actually say what "blob" has done, or does, yet I find it strange that it is there.

[barbaz]

barbazz,

My Apologies for taking so long to reply to your comments. In Truth, the only way that I found out about your "reply", was that I was doing a web search, to learn about this "blob". Lol! I just noticed that the "Notifications", was not checked, so again, My Aoplogies.

No problem.

"That means that it's on the "mandatory" whitelist", Then why doesn't it show up constantly in Noscript?

That entirely has to do with the site. I'm unable to give more of an answer than that, sorry.

And, if it's "Mandatory" what is it, & are it's sources?

"Blob" is strange, .... It does not always appear, it's always faded out, it dims when clicked on, it has no "icon" next to it, nor does it always stay in the Noscript list for the full duration of the time while on Facebook.

See above.
blob: in particular, I would guess might be something to do with Canvas, and therefore it's something generated by a script on the page, but I really have no idea. If I'm right, it's possible that it's related to Facebook doing Canvas Fingerprinting to you, and your machine hangs because of some aspect of it being half-blocked (again, just a guess).

As far as the Freeze-ups, &/or No Response?

Thank you for posting your findings.

[David DeBord]

This "canvass fingerprinting" is like another form of "cookie" then?

[barbaz]

No. Cookies store information, and may or may not be used for tracking.

Fingerprinting is the collecting of information that makes you uniquely identifiable. Canvas fingerprinting looks at how your browser renders a specific Canvas element, which varies a LOT between browsers / OSes / hardware, etc.