IE browser hijacking, anyone have a clue?

[Krusshyk]

Ok, my browser has been hijacked. I got an that was labled from a friends address and opened it, in it was a link to a site that when I went to it, I got all kinds of pop ups and crap. So I alt-F4d out of all the windows and went to restart IE only to find my homepage had been reset. I CANNOT get it to change to anything but this new homepage. Does anyone on here have any experience with this sort of thing? I have been searching online for a long damn time and can't find any answers. The "Highjack This" logfile people are taking forever to get back to me and I would like to get this solved asap. Thanks folks.

[E-bo Obi]

use firefox.

[Jabe Adaks]

use firefox.

Motion seconded.

However either way you do need to rid your system of the spyware that was installed. Make sure your virus definitions are up to day and download Lavasoft ad-aware. Once ad-aware is installed mkae sure its spyware definitions are updated then run a full system scan. Other people here my have recommendations for other anti-spyware tools besides ad-aware.

Not to get in to any debates, but a lot of us have switched to Firefox to avoid these very problems that plague IE6.

Jabe

[E-bo Obi]

I use spybot search and destroy myself. its just a matter of preference, but you need something.

[X'an Shin]

I used to us BOTH spybot and ad-aware. They both pick up on different things, so it's worth using both to try and find that hack.

If all else fails, Back up your essential files, and re-install Windows.

Or use Firefox, which is totally painless and wonderfully reliable.

The only thing I don't like about Firefox is that I can't find a "Temporary Internet Items" substitute that lets me find the movie playing in an HTML window and copy it to a permanent file location.

[Jabe Adaks]

I used to us BOTH spybot and ad-aware. They both pick up on different things, so it's worth using both to try and find that hack.

If all else fails, Back up your essential files, and re-install Windows.

Or use Firefox, which is totally painless and wonderfully reliable.

The only thing I don't like about Firefox is that I can't find a "Temporary Internet Items" substitute that lets me find the movie playing in an HTML window and copy it to a permanent file location.

Usually if you go to file/save you can save the entire contents of the page you are viewing - content and all.

Jabe

[Krusshyk]

I downloaded Firefox bout 10 minutes after I remembered that Zannon has it on his comp. Works great.

Also, I used Ad-aware, Spydot S&D, Spysweeper, AND SpySubtract...all turn up bupkiss on the spyware-o-meter. My virus defs ARE up to date and also reveal nothing. I am at a loss on this one. I am kind of proficient with a computer, but I have never done anything like reinstalling windows or backing up essential files.

And what ever this f****r is, it is beating all of my spyware stuff. Anyone ever heard of Hijack This?

[Jabe Adaks]

I downloaded Firefox bout 10 minutes after I remembered that Zannon has it on his comp. Works great.

Also, I used Ad-aware, Spydot S&D, Spysweeper, AND SpySubtract...all turn up bupkiss on the spyware-o-meter. My virus defs ARE up to date and also reveal nothing. I am at a loss on this one. I am kind of proficient with a computer, but I have never done anything like reinstalling windows or backing up essential files.

And what ever this f****r is, it is beating all of my spyware stuff. Anyone ever heard of Hijack This?

If you are using Windows XP try using the system rollback feature and go back about 24 hours. Whatever it is, you definitely want it off your PC it could have keystroke loggers and God only knows on your system. Don't live with it, make sure you kill it. Trust me, I work for an IT consulting firm and we have found these things to be truly invading whne it comes to grabbing personal information.

Jabe

[Krusshyk]

Crafty little bastards...ever hear of the CoolWebSearch toolbar? If so, then you know that really handy CWShredder tool that identifies and removes the program? I had one of the variants that that tool doesn't work on. Also, ad-aware and the other programs weren't really removing it from my system. It actually installed a program in my add/remove programs log. All I had to do was uninstall it and then reset my initial IE settings along with my homepage...so far it has worked. Now I switch to Mozilla for good, I think.

[X'an Shin]

The only thing I don't like about Firefox is that I can't find a "Temporary Internet Items" substitute that lets me find the movie playing in an HTML window and copy it to a permanent file location.

Usually if you go to file/save you can save the entire contents of the page you are viewing - content and all.

Tried that. Didn't work. Go to Seret's link for that Advent Children FFVII movie, and see if you can save the movie out of that Flash player. That's the one I specifically tried to save and it was a no-go. Let me know if you figure something else out with Firefox.

[E-bo Obi]

You know whats funny is that norton always quarantined hijack this on my one laptop. never found it anywhere else. and any systems I have had mcafee firewall running on in conjunction with firefox never got any spyware.

[MrDooo]

Netscape 7.2 - built with Mozillaâ„¢

http://channels.netscape.com/ns/browsers/download.jsp

[Krusshyk]

Hmmm...what browser should I use? I noticed that people seem to prefer anything BUT IE. Any particular reasons why I should choose one over the other? Or is it just a personal preference thing? What is the difference between Netscape and Firefox? Does netscape do the same thing to Active X that Firefox does (the reason I assume it is more secure than IE)?

[E-bo Obi]

I use firefox cause it sounds cooler than nutscrape.

[X'an Shin]

Hmmm...what browser should I use? I noticed that people seem to prefer anything BUT IE. Any particular reasons why I should choose one over the other? Or is it just a personal preference thing? What is the difference between Netscape and Firefox? Does netscape do the same thing to Active X that Firefox does (the reason I assume it is more secure than IE)?

Active X aside, Firefox is more secure than IE because nobody writes viruses/hacks that exploit Firefox. It's kind of like Mac viruses. Nobody writes them because you would only be hitting like 3% of the marketshare.