Why BlockSite broken? Find which privacy tool is doing it
Privacy tools stack up: the browser’s own protection, one or two extensions, a DNS filter, sometimes a router or antivirus. When a site breaks, any of them could be the reason. Pick the one you use for step-by-step help, or start with the general method below.
Updated November 2026.
Your browser’s own protection
Built into the browser and on by default. They act before (Brave) or after (Firefox) your extensions.
Brave Shields
The lion icon in the address bar: trackers & ads, scripts, cookies, fingerprinting.
Firefox Tracking Protection
The shield in Firefox’s address bar: trackers, cookies, fingerprinters, cryptominers.
Edge Tracking Prevention
Edge’s Basic, Balanced and Strict levels, and per-site exceptions.
Opera’s ad blocker
Opera’s built-in ad and tracker blocking, and its exceptions list.
Blocker extensions
The browser only says “blocked by an extension”, not which one.
uBlock Origin
The power button, the logger, and exception filters that keep everything else blocked.
Privacy Badger
Red, yellow and green sliders, replaced widgets, and “Disable for this site”.
NoScript
Default, Trusted, Temporarily trusted and Custom: allowing only what a page needs.
Other blocker extensions
AdGuard, Ghostery, Adblock Plus, DuckDuckGo, Malwarebytes and similar.
DNS filters
They block for every app on the device or network, and browsers just report that the site couldn’t be found.
NextDNS
Logs, blocklists, security settings and the allowlist.
Control D
Activity log, filters, services and Bypass rules.
AdGuard DNS
The cloud DNS service: query log, blocklists and user rules.
AdGuard Home
Your own server: query log, the Unblock button and custom filtering rules.
Pi-hole
Query log, list search, and allowing domains (Pi-hole v6 and v5).
Everything else
Routers, internet providers, antivirus, VPNs, workplace and school filters.
The general method
- Reload once. Some failures are just a slow server or a dropped connection.
- Try a private window. Most extensions don’t run there unless you’ve allowed them, so if it works there, an extension is likely. (Firefox’s Tracking Protection is stricter in private windows, so it can go the other way.)
- Turn off one layer at a time for this site and reload after each: the browser’s protection, then each extension. Most tools have a per-site switch.
- Nothing helped? Try another network, such as mobile data. If it works there, look at your DNS filter, router or security software.
- Find the exact domain and allow only that one, rather than switching protection off for the whole site.
- Turn everything back on when you’re done.
What breaks most often
- Sign-in and “Sign in with…” buttons: identity-provider scripts and cross-site cookies.
- CAPTCHAs: reCAPTCHA (served from Google and
gstatic.com), hCaptcha and Cloudflare Turnstile. - Payments: Stripe, PayPal and other checkout scripts and frames.
- Video and audio players, often served from an ad or analytics company’s domain.
- Comments, chat and review widgets.
- Consent banners and “anti-flicker” scripts: blocking them can leave a page blank or hidden.
- The site’s own subdomains with tracker-like names (for example
metrics.example.com) that also serve real content.
Why it’s confusing
- The first blocker wins. If two tools block the same domain, only the first is recorded, and the site stays broken until you allow it in both.
- Browsers don’t say which extension blocked a request, only that “an extension” did.
- DNS blocks look like missing sites. The browser just can’t find the address, so it reports the site as unreachable.