imdb.com Virus Warning
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- Joined: Wed May 16, 2001 11:20 pm
imdb.com Virus Warning
(MODS: relocate this thread if necessary; I don't know the right forum for this kind of thing.)
I had two PCs trashed today; both events occured shortly after entering the imdb.com Web site. This wouldn't normally be worth mentioning except that imdb.com is a heavily used, grade-A site that is owned by Amazon.com (last I heard).
Noon, 9/5: PC booted and passed initial virus check. After entering imdb.com, blue screen warning from AntiVir. Virus was deleted, but left four oddly named icons on the desktop. Used both AdAware and SpyBot to clean up afterwards.
Late evening, 9/5: a different PC (laptop) with no anti-virus software launched an unknown install about a minute after entering imdb.com. AdAware deleted about 400 objects, but that did not fix. VirtualBouncer hijacked the system...had to pull the battery to power down. Cycle started over again at power up. The system was basically inop.
I can't find any news about this, not at Symantec, Lavasoft, or the Spybot S&D sites. Maybe it's just me (doubtful), but I'll pass the warning along anyway.
The solution, at least for me, is to wipe both PCs with complete system installs. And I'm staying away from both imdb.com and Amazon.com for awhile. I could email their support staff, but to get the addresses I need to go to their sites and that won't happen.
I had two PCs trashed today; both events occured shortly after entering the imdb.com Web site. This wouldn't normally be worth mentioning except that imdb.com is a heavily used, grade-A site that is owned by Amazon.com (last I heard).
Noon, 9/5: PC booted and passed initial virus check. After entering imdb.com, blue screen warning from AntiVir. Virus was deleted, but left four oddly named icons on the desktop. Used both AdAware and SpyBot to clean up afterwards.
Late evening, 9/5: a different PC (laptop) with no anti-virus software launched an unknown install about a minute after entering imdb.com. AdAware deleted about 400 objects, but that did not fix. VirtualBouncer hijacked the system...had to pull the battery to power down. Cycle started over again at power up. The system was basically inop.
I can't find any news about this, not at Symantec, Lavasoft, or the Spybot S&D sites. Maybe it's just me (doubtful), but I'll pass the warning along anyway.
The solution, at least for me, is to wipe both PCs with complete system installs. And I'm staying away from both imdb.com and Amazon.com for awhile. I could email their support staff, but to get the addresses I need to go to their sites and that won't happen.
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One system has WinME with IE 5.5. The other has WinXP SP1 with IE 6.0. The WinXP got hit the worst, but that was probably because it had no anti-virus software.sysKin wrote:Now back on topic, let me remind you that there is only one web browser that is known for being hijacked by viruses, and it also happens to be the poorest and most feature-less browser of all modern browsers.
Which browser are you using?...
I really hesitated to post this since virus hits are not that unusual. But I figure imdb.com is used by many people here (it's the Internet Movie Database for those who don't know it). And I don't have any experience that Amazon is contaminated. I'm avoiding them by association.
I'm aware of Mozilla, Firefox, and Opera, but I'm still locked into IE since it's the only one that works with some sites that I have to go to . My plan is to set up one PC exclusively for those sites and the other PC for general Web browsing. The first will be a WinXP machine. The second...maybe Linux, or at a minimum I'm going to try Firefox.
You're assuming he's a newbie. Could be an "oldie" just foolin' around.kitsunebeolnet wrote:Heck of a way to make a first impression on us all, huh AD? Ya ought to flush him on GP.
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