Popular ad-blocking tool Adblock Plus plans to allow an independent review board to determine whether ads qualify as “acceptable” and are allowed to pass through its filters, parent company Eyeo GmbH said Tuesday.

Currently, Adblock Plus allows ads from some 700 companies to pass through its filters by default, provided those ads meet its “acceptable ads” policy and aren’t too disruptive or intrusive to users. Eyeo has accepted payment from around 70 of those companies, including Google, Microsoft and Taboola, in exchange for including them in the acceptable ads program.

Eyeo’s business model has faced criticism from some in the digital media industry. Specifically, critics suggest it’s inappropriate for Eyeo itself to help decide which ads are and aren’t “acceptable,” given the fact it’s being paid by some of the companies whose ads are allowed to pass through its Adblock Plus filters.

Eyeo said it now plans to form an independent board to decide what does and does not constitute “acceptable” advertising. The board will include representatives from online publishers and media companies, marketers, advertising companies and consumers, an Eyeo spokesman said. It’s expected to be in place during the first half of 2016.

“Users determined the original criteria and can object in our forum to whitelisting proposals, but since we were the only ad blocker to offer such a compromise we have taken on a large role in the day-to-day maintenance of the criteria,” read a prepared statement by Till Faida, co-founder of Adblock Plus. “We have been looking for a way to make the Acceptable Ads program completely independent while also updating the criteria to evolve with changing forms of online advertising. An independent board solves both issues.”

Adblock’s current requirements for “acceptable” advertising state that ads must not be “annoying,” must not disrupt or distort content on Web pages, are transparent about being paid placements, do not “shout” at users, and are “appropriate” to the sites on which they appear. The new independent review board will be given the freedom to alter these criteria as it sees fit, Eyeo said.

Internet users are increasingly adopting such ad-blocking tools, which can prevent online ads from being displayed as they browse around the Web, potentially threatening the business models of online publishers and media companies that rely on advertising revenue.

Speaking at a news conference in New York on Tuesday morning, Scott Cunningham, general manager of the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Technology Lab, said the online advertising trade group “strongly opposes” ad blocking. Ad-blocking companies “are holding [publishers’] sites and livelihoods hostage,” he said.

Mr. Cunningham didn’t name specific ad-blocking companies during his presentation, but he said one is asking for payment to allow ads past “hurdles” it helps to create.

“We don’t want to see this type of highway robbery,” Mr. Cunningham said.

Write to Jack Marshall at Jack.Marshall@wsj.com