type: incident · created: 2026-08-17 · updated: 2026-08-17 · tags: [incident, adtech, privacy, tracking, research] · confidence: high · affected_sectors: [technology, media] · au_impact: true
DecryptAds — New Free Service Reveals Who's Tracking You
In a substantive consumer-data and adtech piece (14 August), Brian Krebs profiled a new free service called DecryptAds that scrapes and cross-correlates ads.txt / app-ads.txt data to reveal which ad networks are tracking users and how those networks are used in adversarial cross-use.
| Attribute | Detail |
|---|---|
| Service | DecryptAds (free) |
| Method | Scrapes/cross-correlates ads.txt / app-ads.txt |
| Reveals | Which ad networks track users; adversarial cross-use of those networks |
| Source | Krebs on Security — Tier 2/4 |
DecryptAds shines a light on the opaque ad-tech supply chain, showing which third parties are present on a site and how ad networks interoperate — a transparency tool for consumers and researchers.