One-time page hijack - malware or not, how to tell?

Searinox · Jun 22, 2007

It's happened to me only once, but it's not giving me peace of mind.

It was simple. I opened Firefox. I googled something. One of the links was eBaum's World. Clicked it. It took me to a WinAntivirus 2006 page. I already know it's spyware. I did not download it. But how on earth did I get there? I clicked the link that took me there again. This time it took me to the actual page. I closed the browser and repeated the procedure exactly. It didn't happen again. And I haven't had anymore redirects or hijacks after that. But why did it do it? And would there be any risk of it happening again? I scanned Firefox's install folder, it was clean. I have active malware(AV+antispyware) protection always active and never had anything detected. Could it just have been an odd incident? But why?

chaslang · Jun 22, 2007

It could be that something on the pages you were loading actually linked to WinAntivirus. It could be coincidence or it could be malware. We cannot say for sure with so little info. However I will say this, many people who think their PCs are perfectly clean because they don't see any outward malware symptoms are incorrect in there assumption they are clean. If you want to be sure then run the READ & RUN ME sticky and attach the logs. If you are convinced everything is fine then that's okay too. You can just assume it was a coincidence.

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One-time page hijack - malware or not, how to tell?

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chaslang MajorGeeks Admin - Master Malware Expert Staff Member