Christian Bennefeld’s mission is ambitious: “We want to give internet-users their privacy back.” This should be possible with the eBlocker, presented at IFA 2016. The eBlocker is a white cube that is connected to the router via an ethernet cable. Once it is configured, it can significantly reduce or prevent people spying on the user data of all the computers connected to the network.
The user can also block advertisements from appearing on their screen. Websites that would block a user in these circumstances, but still need to be accessed, can be unblocked via a whitelist. The eBlocker also blocks data collectors which create a user profile based on specific websites the user has visited. Side effect of the ad blocker: websites load faster because the time usually spent loading ads is removed. The user can also surf completely anonymously by hiding their IP address.
Finally, the eBlocker also allows ‘cloaking’, which allows the user to manipulate data on the type of computer being used (stationary, tablet, etc.) This allows the user to click one button to change the information sent to the site visited, for example to make it look like they were using a tablet rather than a stationary computer, or the other way around. This can change the pricing on some websites, such as travel portals. Bennefeld demonstrated this at IFA using an example video, which showed how the prices for luxury hotel rooms differed by 60 euros, depending on whether he was looking on a PC or tablet.
