Author Topic: odd popup thing (Read 2211 times)

kenshin-dono · « **on:** January 27, 2010, 08:52:23 AM »

i know this isn't a tech support forum but maybe someone can point me in the right direction. For some reason ive been getting random popup windows in firefox since today. It will open a small new window with an add in it. I never had this before, i may have picked something up browsing a bunch of shady torrent sites looking for the original shuffle. Its just a small window with an add in it, no adressbar or anything else

I ran virus scan and found nothing, and i ran ad aware and just had some cookies and the like. Got rid of them and im still getting it. I even totally uninstalled firefox and reinstalled it. Pop ups are still there

Im using Avaria antivirus and Ad aware. ANyone know what else i could try or better spyware programs i could use to see whats up? Its irritating that this isn't going away. I dont see any other problems other than the

btw i took a screenie of the stupid popup if anyone wants to see.

http://home.comcast.net/~kenshindono/popupproblem.jpg

it apears to be a window with no adress bar, and when i mouse over it apears to be some kinda flash object or something. I jotted down the info on the top of the window from a seperate popup, its something like this:

htttp://media2.tmlath.com/images/prep_ctr?imgfile=4710_567679_7579763.html&partnerId=110380&- windows internet explorer

So anyone know a better spyware detector or something that will help me find out whats going on? Like i said Ad aware and my virus software dont seem to detect anything. Well ad aware will detect a bunch of cookies and junk but they keep coming back. Not even sure if theyre related, i took a log and will try goin over to the adaware forums for now

Aneroph · « **Reply #1 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:05:11 AM »

Do you have 'Ad Block Plus' installed on Firefox? Almost could guarantee it will fix your problem. It also gets rid of all the ads on pages so you just see the meat and potatoes of the site you visit. Aside from that, I would recommend grabbing CCleaner (also free) and just running it through everything to clear out all cookies, temp files, history, registry errors, and whatnot. If it still keeps happening then most likely you got yourself a virus that your anti-v software isn't finding.

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #2 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:24:28 AM »

nope dont got either of those i'll give them a shot. Any other sugestions?

just to be clear its these 2 right?

http://adblockplus.org/en/

http://www.ccleaner.com/

?

agbaba · « **Reply #3 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:27:14 AM »

go to taskmanager and have a look at the processes running on your computer.

If you see something odd google it and you probably will be able to find a fix.

I've experienced similar problems before. It's probably some spyware. often antivirus/antispyware are shit against these kind of pop up spyware.

adblock is a good plug in but it probably will not fix your problem.

Blanchimont · « **Reply #4 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:29:40 AM »

From my setup, ff add ons;

NoScript (what the name says)

AdBlock Plus (what the name says)

CookieSafe (what the name says)

BetterPrivacy (get rid of the 'other' kind of cookies...)

NoReDirect (what the name says)

BlockSite (some popups, like some on megaupload, tend to get past the normal popup blockers, using this to block them based on ip/name...)

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #5 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:33:18 AM »

ya the problem is im not experienced enough to know what tasks should be running in the processes and what shouldnt' in task manager =P Im going througha nd googling them as i go but its a bit confusing. One thing i did notice is i have Isass.exe.. which im not sure if its lsass.exe or Isass.exe. I.e. lowercase l or capital I. I guess ones a virus and ones a windows process. Not really sure how to tell which this is, but id think that my virus program would have caught it if its a virus

your right adblock probably wont actually fix the problem but it could prevent it in the future

thats a lot you got there blanch i guess i'll try googling those. Id like to make sure this is gone before i install all that though or it could just gloss over the problem

DaggerLite · « **Reply #6 on:** January 27, 2010, 02:03:46 PM »

CC Cleaner might remove things it shouldn't if you don't know "what" you're removing from the registry yourself. I'm not sure how good this program is on that, but in my general experience these kinds of programs tend to bring up quite a few things they shouldn't for deletion. The good thing is that they make easy backups of what they remove and probably won't remove anything that causes the system to fail. I'm not sure how good CC Cleaner is at removing rootkit infections.

It's definitely malware, and I recommend trying a clean with Malwarebytes' program. Remember to update its database (manually) before running it, if you're giving it a go.

kyanwan · « **Reply #7 on:** January 27, 2010, 02:50:36 PM »

www.webroot.com

Adaware is shit.

Spybot is shit.

This thing is the best. Way back when - I was able to find these things thru task manager too - even started to use process explorer ( process explorer is way better than trying to use taskmgr to find adware ) --- webroot sweeper - bounds better. It worked so good - I bought a volume license.

psyren · « **Reply #8 on:** January 27, 2010, 02:58:40 PM »

Spybot is good for immunisation, but the scanning takes too long. It does work on most things, though.

bork · « **Reply #9 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:21:37 PM »

malwarebytes does a fair job for my in rooting out some of the Malware.

http://www.malwarebytes.org/

Nikaido · « **Reply #10 on:** January 27, 2010, 09:38:02 PM »

Only problem I had with malwarebytes is the fact that it sometimes eats up 150-170MB of memory, but I disabled the process that causes that, so...

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #11 on:** January 28, 2010, 03:30:33 AM »

so i ran ccleaner as aneroph initially sugested. I ran the top option, not the registery one and it deleted TONS of stuff. A lot of flash and java files and the like. Afterwards i ran one more virus scan and ad aware. After doing a little googling i found process manager and ran that along with task manager to check all the processes running. To my novice eye they seemed legit.

I seem to be fine since using CCleaner. Ive been browsing online for almost a couple hours now without a single popup.

Do you guys think its pretty safe to assume CCleaner dumped whatever the problem was?
I did notice it was always some flash object in the popup so maybe something was hiding in there when it dumped all that stuff. I was Just wondering if i should be good or if i should d.load Spybot, or malwarebytes. I had already d.loaded hijack this but not used it yet. Id like to just go ahead and start snagging those plugins blanchimont recomended.

NoScript (what the name says)

AdBlock Plus (what the name says)

CookieSafe (what the name says)

BetterPrivacy (get rid of the 'other' kind of cookies...)

NoReDirect (what the name says)

BlockSite (some popups, like some on megaupload, tend to get past the normal popup blockers, using this to block them based on ip/name...)

are all those worth snagging or just a few? thats quite a few plug ins if i snag them all

*EDIT*
grr damnit spoke to soon, after i went to youtube for a while i got another one. i quickly opened up taskmanager and the there was a new process. iexplore.exe which i think is just regular internet explorer that i SHOULD have deleted. path is C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe

*sigh* guess i'll have to try some other spyware programs this is annoying, i dont get why it worked fine for hours. I dont supose deleting the folder would do anything?

psyren · « **Reply #12 on:** January 28, 2010, 04:42:13 AM »

CCleaner is not a PC doctor. It is a janitor.

Nikaido · « **Reply #13 on:** January 28, 2010, 04:46:17 AM »

If you ask me best thing to do is back up all your important files and do a complete reinstall of your OS. That'll get rid of it (100%) if you've exhausted all other options.

That's why I keep my OS and programs on my main HDD and my files (anime, school work, projects, driver setups, etc) on my slave. And my laptop's HDD is partitioned, so I'm able to do this on there too.

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #14 on:** January 28, 2010, 04:57:54 AM »

I know ccleaner isn't a docter. I just thought maybe it got rid of the file causing the problems

hah ya i would have rather partitioned this but its a dell xps laptop so it came already pre installed. Backing everything up would be a pain considering most of my externals are just full of anime

had a question for those using malwarebytes.
http://www.malwarebytes.org/
im trying to use malwarebytes but it wont install right. I use 1.44 and it installs but then it wont open or link to the file right. It tries to find mbam.exe but that doesn't exist, i think it changed the names or something.

anyone know if id be fine using 1.43 instead? though i dont seem to see a link to it. Wondering if anyone else had this problem with the program

im trying a few other spyware programs before i do this long annoying thing
http://www.lavasoftsupport.com/index.php?showtopic=13639

i may even install norton that my pops has and see if that does anything. *sigh* what a pain. i havent had to deal with something like this in ages.

Nikaido · « **Reply #15 on:** January 28, 2010, 05:05:01 AM »

Quote from: kenshin-dono on January 28, 2010, 04:57:54 AM

hah ya i would have rather partitioned this but its a dell xps laptop so it came already pre installed. Backing everything up would be a pain considering most of my externals are just full of anime

Dude, sometimes you have to make sacrifices. Or you can always free up your external's space by buying a spindle of DVD-R's. It may take awhile to back up your anime, but it's worth it for the security and reliability of your laptop.

And if you do reinstall, don't forget to partition.

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #16 on:** January 28, 2010, 05:31:53 AM »

well see. i really wanna try to get this fixed without having to go through that hassle. It is most definatly malware. i found out that the reason it wouldn't run is because some programs change the filenames and stuff of malwarebytes. I read through their forum and renamed it and am running it now. I'll give some scans with it and try spybot too. From there if it doesn't work i can try the adaware and malwarebytes forums to see if i can get it sorted out. This malwarebytes program seems a bit better than adaware. Adaware was great back in the day im not so sure these days

definatly gonna partition if i have to fully reinstall. IN fact im on the other old computer right now and this one is partitioned, but thats because i built it myself back in the day.

what a complete pain in the ass.Im never clicking random google links when searching for old anime series again. Biggest gripe is just how time consuming it is doing each scan. like 30-40 mins a pop

Aneroph · « **Reply #17 on:** January 28, 2010, 05:38:56 AM »

Quote from: Nikaido on January 28, 2010, 04:46:17 AM

If you ask me best thing to do is back up all your important files and do a complete reinstall of your OS. That'll get rid of it (100%) if you've exhausted all other options.

That's why I keep my OS and programs on my main HDD and my files (anime, school work, projects, driver setups, etc) on my slave. And my laptop's HDD is partitioned, so I'm able to do this on there too.

That's completely unnecessary! That's what my 85 year old grandfather does every time his computer doesn't work exactly the way he wants it. VERY RARELY is a reinstall of OS needed, and it certainly isn't worth it for a few random pop-ups. Reinstalling your OS is admitting defeat and letting the problem win. If it's not a really serious problem then it's better to struggle for months to fix it than it is to reinstall the OS. The reinstall CD should come with instructions "Bend over; Insert CD; take it like a (fill in the blank)".

CCleaner takes care of all the internet and registry problems. Cookies, cache, and temp files are the biggest reason for getting errors, stolen ID, pop-ups, and tracks. Occasionally your browser will require some registry cleanup as well (I had to modify IE8 registry file to stop my computer from trying to load an active desktop that I never set up).

Just grab some anti-spyware or pop-up blocker software and it will most likely fix it. Perhaps you already had a pop-up blocker that is no longer compatible with the new version of Firefox. So far the only things you say to have done is run CCleaner (probably on default settings so you really didn't clean anything more than what you could clear in Firefox browser by hitting 'clear history') and search for spyware. 9 times out of 10 it's the specific sites you are visiting that are auto opening a pop-up advertisement. A good ad blocker or pop-up stopper will end the problem.

More things to consider:
Have you tried running Firefox in safe mode for a while? Did it solve the issue? If so, it could be plugins, add-ons, or internet files causing it.
You SHOULD have at least one other internet browser, so have you browsed the internet with IE or whatever? Do you still get pop-ups? If not, then the problem is Firefox specific. If you do still get them then most likely it is something deeper in the computer like spyware, a virus, a process, or a program.
Are you going to a porn site habitually that would continually infect your browser with ads? (doesn't have to be porn I guess) If so, STOP GOING. find something safer or find a program to block what it's sending you.
If the problem is specific to Firefox, you could always try a reinstall of Firefox.

But for the love of God!!! DON'T let the problem rape you into reinstalling OS

kenshin-dono · « **Reply #18 on:** January 28, 2010, 07:05:54 AM »

thnx for the sugestions aneroph. Im not planning on reinstalling unless i absolutly cant get rid of this, it really would be a major hassle on this system. I had tried completely reinstalling firefox and CCleaner with adaware scans and avaria scans when i posted this.

The problem is not firefox. In fact it seems the popups are poping up in a separate window in Internet explorer, not firefox. If i look at task manager and the pop up window when the pop up shows up, it reveals that it is showing in IE, not firefox. I dont even use IE. In fact i was pretty sure i had actually uninstalled it in the past o_O Its not just a popup problem with the browser, so just having popup blockers wont help (though i will get them when this is fixed) After looking around, it seems i have a trojan. Ive been messing with malwarebytes (much better than adaware) and after a scan it seems i have the:
Trojan.Vundo.H
virus or something. The problem was the initial install was a pain in the arse because this virus specifically meses with your install. Im posting over on the forum to get it straightned out since i didn't get a complete fix on reboot. It locked me out of starting the program to get the remaining registry errors.

i dont surf random porn sites, i have a few safe ones i frequent ;P I know what gave me this; i was googling for the original happy lesson TV series and wound up geting directed to some super popup heavy shady sites. I left immediately but i guess the dmg was done.

I can also borrow norton from my father, he still has some licences for it though im not sure if it would help. Hopefully malwarebytes fixes it when i get it straightened out. If it was just poopups id still be using the computer but im not sure if theres keyloggers or what with it

at least i got the older computer im using right now. Yeesh you dont realize how often you use a computer untill it becomes unavailable =P

Arveene · « **Reply #19 on:** January 29, 2010, 01:10:21 AM »

Vundo is a pain in the ass. Honestly, I would just reformat. There are guides out there to completely remove it, but it's quite an involved process. Google will be your friend for this.