Popup Hell, HELP !

Hello Ozzu Forum,

I NEED HELP ! I had a "not so savvy" person surfing on my computer yesterday. I looked at the screen and I had not only two task bars, but have been in popup HELL ever since. I'm afraid my 'person' inadvertantly 'answered' a popup ad, which has installed crap all over my computer and I have lost control of my IE6.0.

I am NOT a fan of NS, but... when using NS, I get NO popups. I'm a IE6.0 user, and whatever this is, has taken over my computer. There are directories in my program files that I cannot delete, because a 'certain' file is in use. (it's a .dll file)

Does anyone have any ideas how I can put an end to this? It happens at many different times, when I visit many different sites. I think something's on a 'timer' and is going out and pinging a site that invokes these popups.

(I'm not kidding, say 20 in an hour... not the occasional here and there, it's ridiculas )

I have deleted all my temp internet files, cookies, disabled cookies, and have been blocking the various sites, one at a time (this isn't helping at all)

When a popup comes up, it opens a window and the site it hits first is: http://www.belgiandip.com/go.php? this site seems to be the one invoking the popups. I have blocked the site in my IE6.0 options. Not working.

Does anyone have any experience with this product: http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_56.72.html After looking at it, it seems "good" but I don't want to get sucked in, any further than I am with this Popup Hell.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. I'm sorry to those of you who make a living creating popups and attaching them to various sites, but I have to categorize you along with the people who create computer viruses.

I use the Google toolbar... that blocks 99% of popups...

I'd also run some spyware scanners on your system too.. Because if all these popups are suddenly starting, they've got to be coming from somewhere

I use Google Tool bar and Pop-up stoper.

Pop-up stoper will be enough.

You probably have MySearchbar, My Search or some such variation. You need to check in Control Panel Add remove software. You'll probably see both or some variation of the above.

IF you look, you may also find someone installed either precision time or weather bug.

If you run Adaware, or Spybot search and destroy, you'll probably also find multiple instances of Gain, Gator and Alexa.

I've cleaned that crap off of more computers at work than I can imagine...and 4 weeks later clean it off again. I'll be so happy when I switch to a Windows server environment, where I can completely control the ability for anybody to install anything from the internet.


The best way to approach this, is to go to add/remove software first.

Look up anything you don't recognize on Google. Most of the known spyware/adware stuff will be readily identified on the first 2 pages of results. In most cases, uninstalling the programs will take care of the bulk of it.

You also need to run a spyware proggie as mentioned above afterwards to clean up any leftover registry residue.

//added note -- you should try the uninstall first, before you run an adaware type proggy. If you don't you may get start up errors "file not found" if you do it in reverse, because most removal tools don't nix the startup tasks.

ATNO/TW, HELP

I did go to add/remove, and didn't see anything not recognized there. I googled ad-aware, and downloaded that. Pretty cool looking stuff! I ran that on my computer and it came back with 378 items it cleared off for me

Okay, NOW... when I fire off IE... my toolbar is not visible. I have no way to 'turn it on'... I've just got a IE window, with no toolbar, no URL line, no way to hit my 'favorites'... !!!

PLUS !!! I'm still getting hit with ads

Do you have any suggestions on how I can find my IE toolbar ?!?!?!

If i was you i would uninstall IE and then reinstall it again. You can get the toolbars back from right clicking near the address bar, or going to view - toolbars and they should be there.

Have you run a full antivirus scan? And it might be a good idea to update your spyware program and do another spyware scan just to be sure you got rid of them all.

what spyware program you get? I personally think adaware is the best or spybotS&D.

Keep up posted how you get on.

Try doing a repair of Internet Explorer
http://www.depts.ttu.edu/helpcentral/di ... pairIE.php
(choose the repair option)

If you don't see it listed as shown in the instructions, download the installation directly from MS:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/dow ... efault.asp

I uninstalled IE6 and just reinstalled it, and nothing's changed. Still getting popups, and still no toolbar in IE

I downloaded Ad-aware, which is what found 378 items that it cleaned off, which is when my IE toolbar left

I'm totally bummed

Anymore suggestions ?

what is your homepage in IE? maybe the home page in your browser is what is causing the problems.

I would change it to ozzu or google as they do not contain pop ups. To get your internet toolbars up (the one with home, back etc) rightclick on the top just below where file, edit, view etc is and there should be all the options that you can have.

This may solve the toolbar part:

http://www.fjsmjs.com/IE/notoolbaar.htm (make sure you read the first line and try F11 first) -- before you do any registry editing, back up your registery first.

Adaware should have stopped your popup problem.

You might want to also try Spybot and or Hijack This. It sounds like there is still a resident trojan or something still on your system. Spybot may catch something Adaware missed.

Tone2k11 -- If I understand the problem correctly she's not even seeing the File/View/Tools menus either. Your suggestion about the home page is probably on the money, though.


Also jeannepo, you could try keyboard shortcuts. If your toolbars are simply hidden, Alt+V should bring up the view menu -- from there you should be able to edit your toolbar settings.

ahhh i see, thats a pain.

Some times when i uninstall software my google toolbar dissapears and my address bar and that go aswell. But i have never had file, edit etc go.

Will have to remember that Alt-V brings them all back

Hi Guys,

Well... great suggestion... F11 did the trick... I'm bringing it all back...

My homepage never got changed... it's still about:blank I just checked it, and it has never changed.

Still getting popups... I installed Ad-Aware this morning, and ran that... I mentioned earlier... it removed 378 items, and I'm still getting the popups.

What a total pain. I have NOT edited my registery, however. Seems like my IE is back and running, now. Oh, I also installed the Google toolbar, and I'm still getting popups.

Here's all I've done, so far, and I'm STILL getting tons of popups while using my IE... not NS.

1. downloaded and ran Ad-aware
2. downloaded and ran spybot
3. edited my startup to kill a TON of crap that was autoloading in my startup
4. uninstalled and reinstalled my IE
5. Installed the google toolbar

any more suggestions ? I really don't want to have to format my harddrive for something like this

Copy and paste your startup tasks that are listed and indicate whether or not they are enabled.

It may be helpful although a little more time consuming to give a list of installed applications (skip the standard Windows ones like IE and security updates and the like). Even things that seem benign, like Bridge (if you weren't expecting it to be there), Internet Optomizer (spyware and needs to go), etc...

It sounds like you still have a dialar or something still active. You haven't mentioned it, but can we assume you've run virus scan with updated DATs?