I think my PC is being attacked??

liam62

Hi Folks. Help would be very much appreciated here...

I run peer block which you probably know blocks bad IPs from getting to my machine. I've used it for years (well used to use peer guardian but same thing i think). Anyway just upgraded to win 7 pro a few days ago and in the last 24 hours have noticed peer block is constantly blocking 'ADTECH Avertising' and 'Quantcast'. This happens no matter what website I go to. Ive checked using IE and Firefox. Deleted cookies etc. Ran a boot time scan with AVAST as well as full scans with spybot S&D and SuperAnti Spyware. I also restored the laptop to a few days ago.
All programs are coming up short im afraid and im all out of ideas... This has me a bit worried. Is it a virus/trojan or have some company got my IP address or something of that nature?

Any ideas??
Cheers....

D2D

liam62 wrote: »

Hi Folks. Help would be very much appreciated here...

I run peer block which you probably know blocks bad IPs from getting to my machine. I've used it for years (well used to use peer guardian but same thing i think). Anyway just upgraded to win 7 pro a few days ago and in the last 24 hours have noticed peer block is constantly blocking 'ADTECH Avertising' and 'Quantcast'. This happens no matter what website I go to. Ive checked using IE and Firefox. Deleted cookies etc. Ran a boot time scan with AVAST as well as full scans with spybot S&D and SuperAnti Spyware. I also restored the laptop to a few days ago.
All programs are coming up short im afraid and im all out of ideas... This has me a bit worried. Is it a virus/trojan or have some company got my IP address or something of that nature?

Any ideas??
Cheers....

I'm not really into internet security but I'd say you don't have a virus/trojan in your computer.

ADTECH advertising do the pop-up ads on most websites while Quantcast list the most popular internet sites based by views. Do you have an ad-blocker on your computer??? I'd recomend to get one if not. It filter's out all the ads which might get rid of the ADTECH problem. On the Quantcast issue, I'm not sure on that

Hope this helps

liam62

Thanks for the fast response dare_2_defy...
Good call on the adtech thing. I remember now I always used to see that on skysports or independent.ie and would have to make peer guardian allow it through. Doesn't explain the amount of traffic coming from quantcast, limelight networks Inc et al. though - I just cant figure it out!! Think I've done most things bar reinstall OS which I really dont wanna do.
The way I see it, either something is on my PC and broadcasting my IP to companies in which case AVAST, Superanti Spyware and S&D missed a virus or someone has got my IP. Dunno if that make sense though as I thought my IP changed evrytime I restarted my PC?
I'll keep searching but if anyone has a better understanding of networks then me Id appreciate the input...

D2D

liam62 wrote: »

Thanks for the fast response dare_2_defy...
Good call on the adtech thing. I remember now I always used to see that on skysports or independent.ie and would have to make peer guardian allow it through. Doesn't explain the amount of traffic coming from quantcast, limelight networks Inc et al. though - I just cant figure it out!! Think I've done most things bar reinstall OS which I really dont wanna do.
The way I see it, either something is on my PC and broadcasting my IP to companies in which case AVAST, Superanti Spyware and S&D missed a virus or someone has got my IP. Dunno if that make sense though as I thought my IP changed evrytime I restarted my PC?
I'll keep searching but if anyone has a better understanding of networks then me Id appreciate the input...

Sorry I can't help out more as I don't really know much about it.

Hope you get it sorted thou

Hiya,

I'm generally a Linux, OSX user, though I have this app on my windows machine which might help you,

It is an app called The Ad-Police and can be obtained from here (download.cnet link).

It is a utility which adds to the Hosts file to block most known advertisement servers, I see that the first one which you listed is in the block list off this app, not sure about the other one.

Anyways, it might be worth a shot, I have it operating on my win7 machine.

liam62

Nice one No Drama. I had a look at that program. Didn't seem to get the best of reviews? Anyway, possibly just something similar to the peer block im using or an extension to it. Id prefer to find the route cause of this and stop it rather then just continue blocking it... Thanks for the info in any case.

DiarmaidGNR

Hi, simplest thing to do is download AVG free on another PC and install it on your PC, it is by far the best all rounder and will sort the problem with ease. - Run all scanners while not connected to the internet, and then again once connected.

http://free.avg.com/ww-en/homepage#axzz0c9kbs5pB

liam62

Thanks for the input DiarmuidGNR.
I'd probably have to disagree with you about the AVG being the best all rounder though:D. I had Avast installed and reckon thats probably the best of the free bunch but then thats probably a discussion for a different thread! Anyway, just to make sure I uninstalled avast and installed AVG and am still having the same problems.

So thats:
Avast Scan
AVG scan
S&D scan
Super anti spyware scan

and they all come up clean. This definitely wasnt happening after a win7 fresh install 3 days ago so again if anyone has anymore suggestions I'll give em a shot.
Thanks....

DiarmaidGNR

Did you find any suspicious processes in task manager, -processes tab?

Did you try reinstalling firefox with recommended settings? (do not import settings from IE or anything else)

Did you check your programs list? - It might be one of those pesky add-on programs from when you installed something in the past.

Did you install windows 7 AFTER checking the compatibility of programs using windows 7 upgrade adviser? (shot in the dark)

You could be one of the unlucky few that contract a virus before a solution has been found, but it is more likely to just be an ad-ware issue.

[/B]

Amalgam

OP, this is normal behaviour, you've installed Peerblock with the default set of lists, so, it will show what is being blocked.. which is.. in the default set of lists you've chosen to install!

If you don't want to have that flashing up, disable the ads list in Peerblock and use a blocker in your browser.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantcast

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADTECH

CrinkElite

If you want to get a good look at what packets are leaving your machine and where they're going you should install wireshark.

http://www.wireshark.org/

liam62

Thanks for the replies lads was away for a bit so haven't really looked at it since yesterday - anyway....

Amalgam, yeah I know they probably are harmless ad sites getting to me but why are they trying to ping me every 10 minutes? Even if i just restart firefox and go to google homepage they start pinging after 3 or 4 mins. Definitely wasn't happening for the 1st few days win7 was installed. Having said that im starting to agree with you that I should just suck it up cause I cant find a dam thing on my PC...

DiarmaidGNR - thanks again for the thoughts. Nothing in task manager or prog list. Everything was compatible except Nero so i didnt reinstall that and yeah I agree its probably not a virus as my system is still working pretty fast with nothing exceptional except network traffic.

Crinkelite - ill give your idea a bash tonight and get back with some results...

cheers...

CrinkElite

You may want to examine your bookmarks and firefox plugins.
Is the traffic on port 80?

liam62

Sooooo after many more hours of searching I found nothing im afraid (maybe a good thing?). Anyway, I reckon im just gonna live with it. Im pretty sure there's nothing getting through and peerblock is just warning me that these sites are pinging me. Just found that a bit weird really. Anyway thanks for all the help and if I discover anything in the future i'll be sure to post it....

Stonerr

DiarmaidGNR wrote: »

Hi, simplest thing to do is download AVG free on another PC and install it on your PC, it is by far the best all rounder and will sort the problem with ease. - Run all scanners while not connected to the internet, and then again once connected.

http://free.avg.com/ww-en/homepage#axzz0c9kbs5pB

i agree with this, I love AVG as it catches everything or at atleast almost everything