I use the DuckDuckGo browser on my PC’s and phone and don’t have any issues with ads on flightsim.to (no plug-ins required & it even blocks youtube ads).
I use Firefox browser and think I have an ad-blocker activated that I don’t remember bypassing for the site and I see no pop-up ads of flightsim.to. It’s a wonderful site and I have downloaded a ton of free stuff as well as some purchases from them. I really don’t get how this forum is so locked down for things like developer support and yet we allow attack threads like this to go unchallenged. Free sites need a source of income. You don’t like the ads, then don’t go there but I think encouraging others to do so as well crosses a major ethical line.
Mathjis,
I’m just now seeing this thread, and I wanted to provide some of the evidence you were looking for. Recently, Flightsim.to experienced a rogue ad being injected into their website. I actually encountered one of these ads while browsing the site and captured a screenshot of it and was able to specify what page and ad was causing it.
Flightsim.to was quick to investigate, identify the malicious ad, and remove it. Their response is below, where they acknowledge that a malicious rogue ad had indeed been present on their site.
Fun fact - their solution to avoid this in the future was to pay for a sub 
Sounds to me like they’re trying to push users toward their premium subscription. The OP may be right.
This.
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And this is why I will do all I can to prevent their site from getting any revenue through advertising from me. It’s a trope almost as old as time itself - invent the disease and the cure at the same time.
Why shouldn’t they encourage their users to go to a premium subscription? If everyone did, it would ensure enough future income to keep this valuable resource going. I choose not to so I put up with an occasional ad. Maybe people upset with this should create their own addon site.
I just go on their site and see only an add for Peugeot cars…
I use Edge, which has a built in adblocker, but I also use AdBlock Pro and uBlock Origin. I see no ads on there. I rarely use that site anymore though. I pulled all my content off there a few years ago.
It’s slightly tone-deaf to say ‘hey, if you don’t want to see ads that are against our policies, maybe pay us extra’. It’s a proper solution for a general “I don’t want ads” complaint, but not a safety report.
Can you imagine that in other environments? “We are sorry for the unprofessional behaviour of our ground service contractor towards you. In the future, please consider paying for a premium-class ticket to avoid such problems”
Really you used that term “slightly tone-deaf”? Thought we were supposed to be civil in our discourse here. If flightsim.to were the only site around that contracted with ad agencies that had the potential to put out ads that people might not want, I would understand the argument but the practice of letting some other company administer your ads is widespread and not all those entities are as giving and beneficial as flightsim.to is to sim enthusiasts. Do we want the staff of flightsim.to to spend a great deal of time monitoring their ad content or responding to what I consider an outlier complaint or do we want them providing the service that the vast majority of us delight in? They offered a solution. You didn’t like it. Stop using them. Create your own add-on site for users that has no ads, no delays, no subscriptions and problem is solved.
Yes
If it is such a “great deal” then clearly their choice of ad partner should be reconsidered
Folks,
The bottom line is that NOTHING is FORCED on you. It’s an incredible luxury to have flightsim.to and the countless free addons, search options, payware resource, etc. It’s not food, shelter, and health- it’s a luxury we have the choice of using or not. Yes, like so many sites, they use ads to help them stay in business. Thast’s the world we live in, and nothing new. If the ads bother you, don’t use the site! For me, the ads are a really tiny price to pay for something I use often for free.
As a bit of a computer dummy, I’ll ask here about what I encountered on fs.to a couple of weeks ago…
I was trying to download an ATR livery when a little white box popped up, informing me that fs.to uses ads (blah, blah, blah) and that to proceed, I needed to view the add. Thinking fs.to was reliable, I clicked to view the ad them immediately closed it (I didn’t actually click any links in the ad). I had no other option in order to access the file as the same little box would pop up each time, regardless of how many times the page was either refreshed or re-accessed.
Has my security likely been compromised? I’ve done a basic Windows security sweep and it’s reported nothing.
I have had a redirect a few times from them, but there was never any resulting issues.
I’ve used Flightsim.to in the past as well. In fact, it was one of the sites that ultimately pushed me toward building something similar myself. After using the site and seeing how aggressively it monetizes the platform, I started thinking there had to be a better way to provide the same basic service without putting so many restrictions and advertisements between users and the content they’re looking for.
To me, there’s a pretty significant difference between generating enough revenue to cover reasonable operational costs and building a business around maximizing revenue from the community. From my perspective, Flightsim.to has moved much further toward the latter.
I’ve gone into more detail about my thoughts on this here:
So I was likely safe? Being a bit clueless with computers isn’t really conducive to flight simming!
Yes, I had no issues from it and I still check into the site daily.
Do you want to see a 13-year old child presented with an explicitly NSFW picture as part of an ad? Because that was the last straw for me before I decided to install my ad blocker. And yes, it was on flightsim.to, and it was an ad for adult “toys.”
More than likely you are ok. But you can also download the free version of Malwarebytes. Run it and see if it finds anything. Sometimes antivirus software won’t pick up certain malware. I’ve used it along side my antivurus for years. Good luck!