Bussolaweb Invasion

Discussion in 'Malware Help - MG (A Specialist Will Reply)' started by James Davey, Mar 29, 2003.

  1. James Davey

    James Davey Private E-2

    Hi all!
    I'm James. and I'm new to this site but it comes highly recomended as the best place to find answers. I'm not even really sure I am posting this in the right section, but there doesn't seem to be one for Internet.
    This problem has been considered by people in UK, USA, Australia and Europe, so you can be certain we have tried all the obvious things.
    Here it is. My Internet Home Page is Freeserve. It is set as such in Internet Options as the default page. Every second day, as soon as I activate Internet Explorer, up comes an Italian page entitled 'Bussolaweb'. I can't read Italian but it seems to have some fairly adult content available.. On selecting, Tools and Internet Options, you find Bussolaweb has set itself as the Home Page. It has also included itself in Favourites. Resetting the Default Home Page brings back Freeserve, but only for 2 days. You can delete Bussolaweb from everrywhere you can find, use an Internet Washer set to clean out absolutely everything and still it comes back every 2nd day. I have a Firewall and an Anti Virus program. Please let me know if you have any ideas as it is driving me crazy!
     
    James Davey, Mar 29, 2003
    #1
  2. Major Attitude

    Major Attitude Co-Owner MajorGeeks.Com Staff Member

    James,
    Welcome aboard! First thought is some sort of Spyware, please download Ad-Aware or Spybot S&D from our spyware category and run it. This will find programs that could take over your browser, force unwanted popups and trackk your internet activity. Most internet cleaners stick to temporary files, cookies, etc. and wont cover this.

    I like Ad-Aware better because its a bit simpler to use:

    http://www.majorgeeks.com/article.php?sid=506&cat=31


    Spybot does a nice job explaining what each Spyware program is if you want to spend time and get geeky with it:

    http://www.majorgeeks.com/article.php?sid=2471&cat=31

    If those fail, try Hijack This, a program that detects, removes and prevents what is known as browser hijacking (taking over browser and changing home page) which sounds like your problem, though try this one last:

    http://www.majorgeeks.com/article.php?sid=3155&cat=31
     
    Major Attitude, Mar 29, 2003
    #2
  3. Kodo

    Kodo SNATCHSQUATCH

    MA,
    FYI, spybot 1.2 allows homepage locking as well :)
     
    Kodo, Mar 29, 2003
    #3
  4. James Davey

    James Davey Private E-2

    Thanks Major Attitude and Kodo for your replies.
    I already have Ad-Aware 5 (Release 5.83) but I have to admit I hadn't thought of running it. I ran it last night and it found quite a few things. I made a backup of them and erased the lot. Result....... Bussolaweb back again tonight! I haven't tried Spybot, but if Ad-Aware failed totally, will Spybot SD do any better? Obviously I've been asking everyone I know (to the extent that I'm about to be barred from my local if I don't shut up about it!) and someone has suggested it sounds like a virus. Have you any thoughts on that possibility? My Anti Virus program is AntiVir 9x (version 6) which I run every day and so far it has picked up nothing.
    I honestly don't consider I know much about computers, but your reference to Hijack This sounds like a real last resort.
     
    James Davey, Mar 31, 2003
    #4
  5. iamien

    iamien Cptn "Eh!"

    Use spybots home page lock and forget about it,that'll keep your page as what you want =D
     
    iamien, Mar 31, 2003
    #5
  6. Major Attitude

    Major Attitude Co-Owner MajorGeeks.Com Staff Member

    There ya go. Your also using an outdated copy of Ad-Aware, need to download version 6 and then update to latest refererce file via built in updater.

    What I did last time was use a registry tool to find all entries from that program. While you can protect your home page, as people suggested, you dont stop the program from running on your machine, wasting resources, causing conflicts and possibly still spying on you.

     
    Major Attitude, Mar 31, 2003
    #6
  7. berutti

    berutti Private E-2

    Hy everbody I'm italian.
    I had bussolaweb "invasion" since one year or more.
    I tried with the updated versoin of SpyBot and Ad.aware 6, but same days later it comes again.
    Someone has somethin to suggest pleas.
    Poi se lo spiegasse in italiano sarebbe ancora meglio
    Thanks everyone. Carlo :)
     
    berutti, Sep 5, 2004
    #7

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