@#$%! Toolbars

[Darren Harris]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

A whole lot of garbage just appear in a new tolbar, and I have no idea
where it came from. I haven't downloaded or installed anything lately,
and I'm not sure if I should blame Ad-Aware or Spybot(neither of which
work on my WindowsME system).

The Sygate Personal Fiewall obviously was of no help either, and I'm
wondering if anyone else has this problem.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[Kerry Liles]

Firewalls typically have no ability to prevent you from acquiring
toolbars... most of the crapware that installs toolbars hope people are
click happy and click OK whenever they see that option [some stupid video
card vendors offer an option to force the mouse pointer on the OK button of
a dialog box - and have this ON by default, but I digress]

It would help immensely if you could figure out the NAME of the toolbar that
has glommed onto you.

You could then use www.google.com to search for, let's see:
xxxxxxxxx +uninstall remove
where xxxxxxxxxx is the name of the toolbar.

One of the hits with Google might be a removal tool or instructions on how
to do so yourself.

HTH - good luck

 

[Tim Weaver]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

A whole lot of garbage just appear in a new tolbar, and I have no idea
where it came from. I haven't downloaded or installed anything lately,
and I'm not sure if I should blame Ad-Aware or Spybot(neither of which
work on my WindowsME system).

The Sygate Personal Fiewall obviously was of no help either, and I'm
wondering if anyone else has this problem.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

One of the best things you can do is get IE-SPYAD. This makes a lot of
entries into the registry which puts known spyware sites into the restricted
zone where they can't execute scripts. This will keep anything from being
installed. Also, in your Internet Options -> Advanced tab, make sure both
"Enable Install On Demand" options are unticked.

 

[Tim Weaver]

One of the best things you can do is get IE-SPYAD. This makes a lot of
entries into the registry which puts known spyware sites into the
restricted zone where they can't execute scripts. This will keep
anything from being installed. Also, in your Internet Options ->
Advanced tab, make sure both "Enable Install On Demand" options are
unticked.

Whoops... IE-SPYAD URL:

https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/ehowes/www/resource.htm

 

[-Lone_Wolf-]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

A whole lot of garbage just appear in a new tolbar, and I have no idea
where it came from. I haven't downloaded or installed anything lately,
and I'm not sure if I should blame Ad-Aware or Spybot(neither of which
work on my WindowsME system).

The Sygate Personal Fiewall obviously was of no help either, and I'm
wondering if anyone else has this problem.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I am not sure when I picked up the new option in IE but I now have under
tools a "Manage Add-ons..." option that once clicked lists all the crap not
native to IE allowing you to delete at will. This may have been added in the
XP SP2 and I am assuming you are using WIN ME so I am not sure if this
option is available in your OS?

John

 

[Elly Byrne]

Have you looked in your startup folder to see if something is loading
itself there?

Have you checked msconfig to see what is loading itself there?

Elly Byrne
Tinnitus Resources - The Book
http://tinnitusbook.com/

 

[John Corliss]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

A whole lot of garbage just appear in a new tolbar, and I have no idea
where it came from. I haven't downloaded or installed anything lately,
and I'm not sure if I should blame Ad-Aware or Spybot(neither of which
work on my WindowsME system).

The Sygate Personal Fiewall obviously was of no help either, and I'm
wondering if anyone else has this problem.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Darren, what browser and version of it are you using?

 

[Z]

One of the best things you can do is get IE-SPYAD. This makes a lot of
entries into the registry which puts known spyware sites into the restricted
zone where they can't execute scripts. This will keep anything from being
installed. Also, in your Internet Options -> Advanced tab, make sure both
"Enable Install On Demand" options are unticked.

Or download and use Mozilla, a browser without the gaping holes and
horrible default settings that come with Internet Explorer.

 

[Mel]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

I'm not sure if I should blame Ad-Aware or Spybot(neither of which

work on my WindowsME system).

Then chances are that you may have acquired one of the more unpleasant
species of spyware and that it is disabling them.

http://www.doxdesk.com/parasite/ runs a script that can identify some parasites
and provide removal information.

HijackThis http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/downloads.html
may be helpful

"It does not target specific programs/URLs, just the methods used by hijackers to force you onto their sites. As a result, false
positives are imminent and unless you are sure what you're doing, you should always consult with knowledgeable folks (e.g. the
forums) before deleting anything."

Also autoruns http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/autoruns.shtml
Can remove or temporarily disable programs that run at start-up (and Browser Helper objects)

If you are using IE, you should also check your security zones settings are set at Default
or better and your trusted publisher list (Internet Options ->Content > Publishers button)

 

[Mel]

Can remove or temporarily disable programs that run at start-up (and Browser Helper objects)

Sorry, meant it can remove or disable a programs autorun entry.

 

[brainz]

It's a royal pain to have to adjust my toolbar every other day, but it
worse when some new crap inserts itself there.

Sounds like a job for hijackThis.exe
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=3155
kind regards
brainz

 

[Dick Hazeleger]

Sounds like a job for hijackThis.exe
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=3155
kind regards
brainz

Darren,

AdAware and Spybot don't run on your Windows ME? Hmmm, I would suggest
to get a copy of CWShredder, and check whether you have one of those...
there are a few out there that target Anti-spyware tools like those.

If you can download HiJackThis (as suggested earlier) then it is a good
idea to run a scan with it, save the log file, and post it to one of
the many anti-spyware forums.

Oh, before you remove any spyware... disable your system restore
points... your faithful OS otherwise may thing that you miss something
really necessary... and put it back again!

When your system is cleaned, I would advise you to install
SpywareBlaster and SpyWareGuard (http://www.javacoolsoftware.com).

HtH
Dick

 

[Shane]

Oh, before you remove any spyware... disable your system restore

points... your faithful OS otherwise may thing that you miss something
really necessary... and put it back again!

It doesn't work that way.


Shane

 

[Dick Hazeleger]

It doesn't work that way.


Shane

No? Have a thorough look at the "Anti-Spyware" support forums, when
they find out that you're running ME or XP, the first thing they will
tell you is that you should turn off System Restore... for the simple
reason I wrote above.... BTW: It's the same with virus infections: turn
off the setting, clean the system, turn the setting on again!

Regards
Dick

 

[Mike M]

No? Have a thorough look at the "Anti-Spyware" support forums, when
they find out that you're running ME or XP, the first thing they will
tell you is that you should turn off System Restore... for the simple
reason I wrote above.... BTW: It's the same with virus infections:
turn off the setting, clean the system, turn the setting on again!

And everyone who gives such advice is wrong and clearly doesn't understand
what and how system restore works. Disable SR and clear the archive once
the problem is resolved but not before as this removes the lifeline of
being able to restore a trashed system to a good state using a system
checkpoint created before infection.

An infected archive will never cause a problem unless a user voluntarily
chooses to restore to a checkpoint created after infection and before the
system was cleaned. Even that might be acceptable if the user manages to
create an unusable system whilst trying to clean their system.

 

[JAD]

either way works.......fix - disable - re-enable - disable -
fix - re-enable

personally-I would not want to restore to an infected restore point

 

[Mike M]

But if not yourself a user may well want to restore to an uninfected
checkpoint created prior to any infection. By flushing the restore
archive as a first action one removes such action from ones armoury of
tools.

 

[JAD]

"personally-I would" this would mean its my opinion...I wouldn't
you can

 

[Heather]

JAD.......

You are not understanding what Mike is saying to you......and any others
that follow your line of thinking. I will admit it took me a while to *get
it*, but perhaps I can put it in simpler English for you. Make that
*Canadian English* (G).

If you disable and clear out the System Restore BEFORE getting rid of the
offending object, you have also thrown away any chance of restoring your
computer, should you happen to screw something up!!! You will have NO
restore points to go back to.

In other words, you CAN restore to a point BEFORE you got infected and you
will NOT be restoring the virus/trojan/whatever to your computer.

Is this any clearer??

And Mike......I hope I got that across right.....or for that matter, I hope
I got it right, grin!!

It is a hard concept for people to get their minds around.......all they are
thinking is *get rid of this blasted malware*!!

Cheers and off for supper......Heather

 

[JAD]

thanks but it was not necessary


restoring to an infected state, for me, serves no purpose. I have
never had the displeasure of having a system screwed up because of
virus removal since I was on the 12 step 'Rid myself of norton"
therapy years ago. AFA spyware and such, it rarely infects my machines
and has never been a big problem. when it does, hijackthis is the
ultimate in removal. (and should be used by some one who understands
the difference between 'BACK up' and system restore. ;^)