In the 12 months to August, ad-blocking cost advertisers $US22 billion as the use of some type of ad-blocking software increased 41 per cent globally to 198 million users.

Advertising pays the bills for much of the online world, for publishers and tech giants alike.

At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Google managing director of media and platforms Ben Faes and Yahoo vice president and general manager of advertising Nick Hugh joined  Roi Carthy, the chief marketing officer of Shine Technologies, an ad-blocker that allows telecommunications network operators to block ads before they even reach the customers' phone, joined a panel where tensions soared.

Mr Carthy called his company a "nuclear weapon" on the advertising world.

The problem, from a publisher or advertiser perspective, is that Shine works at a network level – before it reaches the phone.

Google and Yahoo both make big money from advertising, so it's no surprise to see them amped up about this threat to their revenue.

It seems unlikely that Australians will see Shine have a major impact down under – despite Mr Carthy previously telling Fairfax Media that conversations have been had with local telcos.

Telstra-owned Ooyala sells anti-ad blocking software and the telco told Fairfax Media:  "We're aware that some international telcos are trialling ad blocking technology but we don't have any plans to implement it on our network at this time."

Optus, along with its parent company Singtel, have their own mobile advertising business Amobee, and Vodafone Australia have also said they have no plans in the ad-blocking space.

Consumers are angry at advertisers as well. Factoring out annoying pop-up ads that the advertising industry generally agrees needs to be fixed, the majority of online advertising tracks users, sucks up data – which on a mobile plan can be limited – and causes pages to load slower.

If it never comes to your phone, then you'll never use any data on it – the consumer appeal is plain to see.

And herein lies the challenge for advertisers. The data collected from users is the gold nugget for online ads, it allows advertisers to get a better insight into potential customers and hopefully serve them ads which they are more interest in.

The problem is that without advertising revenue, publishers and websites will struggle to pay staff, therefore meaning the content that people want to view without ads around it simply won't exist.

Yahoo last year confirmed that it had stopped some its users, who were using ad-blockers, from accessing their Yahoo Mail, telling them to turn off the software to gain access.

Companies like US-based Sourcepoint Technologies have software for publishers that blocks ad-blockers and gives consumers the options of paying the publisher to get rid of ads.

The Washington Post has been exploring how to combat ad-blocking through the use of similar types of software.

Time will tell as to how the tech and media industry address the growing ad-blocking problem. But ultimately, ad-blockers are not going to go away so the media sector will need to find a way to address the issues consumers have with advertising or create a new value exchange with them.