Why is google leading me to junk websites?

quinnd6

I go to google.ie and I could be trying to find out something and I click on what should be a legitimate link such as boards.ie even and avforums and I get a piece of crap website taking over with some phone number, some hotline website or adultfriendfinder.com.
I'm so fed up of this why is it doing this crap?

Now I have a bloody message popping up saying unauthorized person is trying to steal your passwords and private information. Click on the message to prevent identity theft.
Sad thing is I don't know if that message is spam.

What should I do to avoid all this garbage.
I'm using avast antivirus at the moment.
Shouldn't it be stopping this kind of crap.

bluferbl

Sounds like your browser has been hijacked. Start your PC in Safe Mode and run a Bitdefender Online scan, stay in Safe Mode, install Malwarebytes and do a full scan. Stay in safe Mode and install Spybot Search and destroy and do a full scan. also use Spybot Search and Destroy to immunise your browsers. Keep doing all of the above until they stop finding malware/infections. If that doesn't do it, there are further tools that you could use to do more cleaning. Hope that helps!

EKRIUQ

Avast is more for virus's and trogans and it sounds like you have spyware installed, Download spybot search and destroy and Ad-aware to rid you of this.

Einstein

Spybot's good, but try Advanced System Care...since I installed that I've no need to SB or Adaware...
+1 on the hijack though, although no need for safemode imho.

phelixoflaherty

Why is it written like a poem?

lmimmfn

whats wrong with Pr0n? haha

-=al=-

malware bytes should save the day...

got a nasty virus a while back that would hijack the browsers, disable any malware/anti virus websites, disable the anti virus too and made it unclickable

pretty bad stuff but malwarebytes cleaned it up in a jiffy, free and simple to use too..

quinnd6

Yep Malwarebytes has helped a lot.
The thing telling me an unauthorized person is trying to steal your passwords and information was indeed garbage malware.
It was a fake windows security alert and using Malwarebytes I did a quick scan and got rid of it and in total about 15 infected files.
So it's great to have gotten rid of that, it was a real pain.

Right after that though a fake anti virus software installed itself on my pc without my permission after visiting a search result from google.
I had to run Malwarebytes again to get rid of it.

My google links are still being hijacked cos I got some garbage site from a link after all that. I'm running a full scan on Malwarebytes to see if that fixes it.
It's been running for over an hour and a half this time and hasn't found anything so far.

bluferbl

In my experience (I do this for a living...a lot of my work is removing infections) you need to run all of the programs I mentioned, you need to run them more than once and you also need to do it in Safe Mode to make sure that the infections you are trying to remove are not in memory at the time. Also from experience, if you do not fully clean the machine, it will be reinfected in no time time flat. Takes ages though!

quinnd6

Thanks I will give that a go.

Solitaire

Damage to the browser may continue after you've run all the antimalware so make sure you manually clean the Hosts file yourself before exiting Safe Mode! That should hopefully stop the malicious redirects on your hijacked browser and by extension reduce the chance of being reinfected straight off the bat

Here's directions to find where its lurking, and here's what should be in there! On that link go Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C, then open the hosts file and go Ctrl+A, Ctrl+V, Save. Done!

Note that if you ever find a load of stuff in Hosts that isn't commented out its a good symptom that you've been 'jacked

quinnd6

I had a look at my hosts file there.
It has tons of addresses and there is a comment before the addresses saying "# Start of entries inserted by Spybot - Search & Destroy" and another at the end of the addresses saying "# End of entries inserted by Spybot - Search & Destroy".

Solitaire

Not sure, could be malicious data masquerading as Spybot. Simple solution: staying in Safe Mode, do what I said to clean the Hosts file then run Spybot's Immunize function. Unless even your Spybot install has been compromised that should restore any beneficial browser redirection it gives you but with all the malicious junk gone

quinnd6

Unfortunately I did something very stupid today.
I put my pc into safe mode and ran a scan with ad aware.
It said it had removed all malicious malware and advised me to restart my computer.
So thats what I did and now I can't even login.
My pc is completely screwed.
It comes up with a blue screen and this error.
" Stop: c00021a {fatal system error}
The windows logon Process system process terminated unexpectedly
with a status of 0xc0000034 (0x00000000 0x00000000).
The system has been shut down."

Is there anything I can do?
I can't even login using safe mode anymore.

bhickey

It looks like you'll need to pull out your Windows disk. What Windows are you on? If XP, then have a look at :

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q307654/

and

http://webcast.broadcastnewsroom.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=8658

quinnd6

I'm on Windows XP.
So do I need to reinstall windows or what?

Why did ad aware screw up my entire system?
I thought it was designed to help git rid of malware not screw up your entire computer so its unusable.

bhickey

quinnd6 wrote: »

I'm on Windows XP.
So do I need to reinstall windows or what?

Hopefully not, just read the links and follow the instructions.

quinnd6

I don't have the adminstrator password so can't gain access to the recovery console for my installation of windows xp.
Maybe repair install is the best option?
Would it be?

Well just tried the repair install there and it crashed with 34 mins remaining 3 times I tried so repair install isn't going to work.

I guess my final option is to reinstall windows from scratch.
Does anyone know is it difficult and does it take long?
I've never done it before is it complicated or is it just a matter of following basic instructions on the screen?

bhickey

quinnd6 wrote: »

I guess my final option is to reinstall windows from scratch.
Does anyone know is it difficult and does it take long?
I've never done it before is it complicated or is it just a matter of following basic instructions on the screen?

The administrator password wouldn't just be blank would it?

Depending on your hardware and whether or not you have all the various drivers, reinstalling Windows is straightforward. The only issue you might have is getting the drivers for your hardware bits. The network card is the first one to get sorted 'cause then you can download all the other updates (and there will be many!) that will need to be installed.

Before you start though, do you have any data that you need to recover first?

quinnd6

No I have any important data and files backed up on my usb harddrive so I think it'll be okay.
I tried entering nothing for the administrator password before and it didn't work.
I don't think I have drivers backed up but I can download them after anyway so should be ok I think I'll give it a try.

quinnd6

So I did a fresh re-install and all is working well thank goodness.
I will never use ad aware ever again after my experience and I advise other people to never use it.
It made my pc so bad that I couldn't login or even do a repair install.
So beware never use ad aware.
I used it in safe mode and it killed my pc and only option for me was a fresh install of Windows XP.