browser hikacked

My wife and I both have a laptop and both pc's have yahoo for home page. Both pc's now do not go to yahoo either via the home icon or typing it in. It goes to a site called mediaplex.com I can go to all other sites ie: google etc.. It's odd how both pc's became infected overnight even though we both log off. Anyways I would like/need help removing this as my mcafee or hers didn't even see it. If I need to get into the registry I need good directions so I don't hose us up...thanks

 

Did you try resetting the browser. I know you can do this with Mac but not sure about PC. You could try emptying the browser cache and history to see if that will work.

Good luck!

 

If you can get to Google lookup malwarebytes. If you are able to get to the site download it. However some malware/viruses may block it. If you do manage to install it, before you actually run the program goto its install folder. Should be along the lines of c:\program files\malwarebytes. In that folder should be a file called mbam.exe. Right click and rename it to something else: ie 1234. Run it and see if it helps.

Or it could be a setting within your browser that got tweaked. Just don't remem

 

Remember the place off the top of my head...

Sorry for the goofy post hit the post button on the phone too soon.

 

Do a web search fro the site.
Then look for reputable sites for a fix. CNET, Kim Komando etc

 

I roll with firewall, malware and AVG anti-virus here, never an issue. All free stuff. My suggestion would be to throw in the OS install disk and delete partition, create new partition, format & reinstall OS and rest of software. Trying to fuck with registry and clean shit up is time wasting and possibly inaffective depending on what happened. This is why I have all my important shit on an external drive or at least a 2nd drive in a desktop so if or when this happens you can just punt and have clean start. It also protects you against drive failure to some degree as well. Redundant backup of important shit is important. Always have OS disk, oem restore disk & whatever other software that you can't get from net & worry much less. Good luck with it.

 

that sounds easy I will check

 

amazing quote of the day.... "Redundant" statement is, in fact, redundant.

 

I just had that happen to my work computer, the IT guy went and got Super anti-spyware, it was a free download and it cleared it right up.

 

I have been googling and I think I may have router issue. Since the two laptops were infected at the sametime. Need to clear the dns cache, which i wil try later

 

OP, IMHO I don't believe you have a router issue. The first thing I would try is to open Addd/Remove programs and look for any program that looks to be the culprit(s). Try to uninstall those. Then open Internet Explorer Add-Ons, and remove any Add-Ons that you don't want. These would be programs that open when IE opens, such as a Google Toolbar. A lot of these little pesky programs run as IE Add-Ons. Reboot. Then run your currently installed Spyware program and run a deep scan. Do it twice. If you don't have one installed, install a basic one, such as Microsoft Security Essentials and run it twice like mentioned above. Then run your anti-virus through a deep scan. Reboot and take an assessment of how much this fixed.

If the issue is fixed, move on. If not, I would suggest backing up up your data and trying to a System Restore to an earlier time before this happened. If that doesn't work, there's a few things you can try, but I'd probably save my time and do like a previous poster suggested, which is to wipe the OS and start clean. If you aren't a Windows pro, and you install/uninstall a lot of stuff, you'll probably want to do this every couple of years anyways.

 

I second the malwarebytes removal tool. You can d-load the free version from malwarebytes.org
Once you install it update it right away then perform a quick scan. Once the scan completes just follow the instructions to complete the spyware removal.

 

Thanks for all the tips guys. I have been at work so I have not been able to try these things out, but it seems like Linksy's has an issue with their routers that allows stuff like this to go on.. even heard where someone had 1800.00 taken from bank account. If you guys have a linksys router better watch out for this problem. At the same time I hope you are right and it is not the router. I would like to choke people who do this crap!

 

Your Linksys router is not the issue in this case.

You may want to try AdAware if MalwareBytes does not pick this up. I just had the same thing happen to one of my users home PCs last week and Adaware removed it by doing a FULL SCAN...

 

This is the weird thing. Both mine and my wifes laptop both were "infected" for lack of a better word, at the same exact time. No matter what I tried to fix it didn't help, so we went to work and came home later that day and the problem had fixed itself.

 

Agree that this is not a routing issue. I personally don't care for Linksys consumer routing gear, but in terms of packet filterning and packet inspection, the Linksys router is doing nothing different than other routers. There may obviously be an issue with how security is configured on your router thus allowing someone to connect to your network and compromise security. However, this would not be a problem caused by Linksys routers. As far as this being a router-specific issue, I would still suggest looking elsewhere for the root cause.

 

thanks, but...if you google it lots of people say it is a router issue i'm just saying

 

Blaming the router for this issue is like blaming the road for a flat tire.

 

Some of the more "innocent" malware hijacks the host file. Windows has a file called "hosts"--do a search for it and make sure there's nothing in it.

In addition, you should go through the other suggestions. Especially the ones suggesting firewalls and increased router security--at a minimum, I would make certain the router was up to date with respect to firmware.

 

you ever driven through a pot hole?