PCFormat Forum Archive

Hi folks
For the last few days I've had a firefox window suddenly open with the link http://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/drt/s. This then resolves to some other link which changes. The window has no visable content. The irritating part is that the window open regardless of whether I am in the browser at the time or not, and it also sets the focus on the browser window.
So you're busy typing in your spreadsheet, and suddenly firefox opens and you're tying away on nothing.
It happens around once every 30 mins or so.
Have run the usual ad-aware and antivirus but it picks up nothing.
I suspect some other application is requesting the link, but not sure how to proceed from here...

What changes did you make to your system in the past few days?

Moving this thread to Security as I suspect malware on the system, even though your scans haven't turned up anything at this stage.

Could a cookie be doing this?

Try:
http://support.kaspersky.com/viruses/so ... =208280684

Alternatively it seems your router's DNS might have been changed without your knowing. Check this as well.

No system changes I can recall, and so far it seems I'm the only person on the domain suffering this irritation.
My home PC has also done this once in a while, but not nearly as often. Only thing that I recall is using the "cartown" app on facebook about the same time it started, and I use facebook at work once in a while.
Will try the kapersky rootkit tool and see.
Can't see much point in it except that it seems to add a 'click' to whatever randon add was supposed to come up. Think google is fraudulently charging people for clicks when they don't actually get any? Where is my conspiracy hat...

Try clear history, cookies, temp files, internet temp files. Reinstall firefox. Change default to IE and see if same thing happens or install Opera or chrome.

What programs did you use to scan?

using ad-aware free edition and AV is NOD32 corporate
deleting cache did not seem to help, changed default browser to IE, will see what opens now.

YUp, now IE opens instead of firefox.

Did you try the EXE from Kaspersky?

just to be otherwise, winzip is giving me uphill now. But weirdly, today, not a single occurance.