Search engine problems.

[Shades Coolray]

Alright here's my problem: I can get on the internet fine and everything, but a lot of the search engines appear to be down. I can't get on google.com or altavista.com at all. I can get on Yahoo's main page, but the search always times out. Anyone else having these problems?

[taddzilla]

Shades,

I use the search from go.com, which is powered by google. No problems here.

[Shades Coolray]

go.com isn't working for me either. It still times out for some reason. Also, it's doing it in both IE and Mozilla.

[Shades Coolray]

msn.com, aol.com, and webcrawler.com search also no good, they all try to connect and time out.

[Shades Coolray]

Lycos, Hotbot, and MetaCrawler are all doing the same thing. This is very strange how only the search engines aren't working for me. Typing other webpages in on the address bar works fine, but every single search engine is either not letting me on the page, or it lets me on its main page, but search times out.

[NitnayLion]

I have been useing Google all night and havent had a problem.

[-pin-]

they haven't been added to your hosts file by a malware have they?

[c0lin]

i read somewhere the other day that there is a virus on the loose that changes DNS entries in windows and points address's of popular search engines to a page maintained by hackers.
you might have that...

try doing an anti-virus / trojan scan

:type:

[Shades Coolray]

Originally posted by -pin-
they haven't been added to your hosts file by a malware have they?

There was some sort of spyware\ adware program that got on my system a few days ago that had something to do with searching, it put a bar underneath the address bar in IE, so I got rid of it with Ad-Aware. How do you find out if it did something to your hosts file?

[Fister]

reinstall your IE if the warden will let you...

[Roadblock]

I think Ad-Aware has a built in thingy to check your HOSTS file for hijack attempts. I also would recommend installing and running SpyBot Search and Destroy and installing their HOSTS file. I like to use both Ad-Aware and SpyBot S&D. ;)

[Shades Coolray]

Originally posted by Roadblock
I think Ad-Aware has a built in thingy to check your HOSTS file for hijack attempts. I also would recommend installing and running SpyBot Search and Destroy and installing their HOSTS file. I like to use both Ad-Aware and SpyBot S&D. ;)

You're the man RB!! Spybot found all sorts of hijack programs and stuff on my machine, there was so much crud I couldn't believe it! Needless to say it solved my problem. I was thinking I might have to FDISK my machine again, so you definately saved me a headache RB.

[Shades Coolray]

Originally posted by fister
reinstall your IE if the warden will let you...

You looked at my profile didn't you. By the way, I've never actually been to prison, I just put that to be sarcastic.

[Shades Coolray]

Okay, maybe I haven't totally fixed my problem yet. Google and Altavista still aren't working (Yahoo and lots of others are now) so there's still a hijacked HOSTS file on my computer somewhere. Hopefully I can fix it.

(These adware\ spyware dudes are getting really agressive if both Ad-Aware and Spybot can't kill this junk.) Me---->:blaster: @spyware dudes

[Shades Coolray]

Alright, I looked at my hosts file and this is majorly messed up. Now my question is how do I fix this?

[Roadblock]

look trough the options on SpyBot S&D and make sure you are using the "Advanced Version." You have the option of using the advanced settings or not. Then make sure you import the HOSTS file that Spybot has available. It should replace you existing Hosts file, and make a back up copy of it, should you ever wish to re-instate it. (not that you ever would). The Hosts file you listed is not the one from SpyBot, I am almost positive. If you have any trouble doing this, let me kniow, and I will try to post some more instructions and screenshots. :)

[Roadblock]

Ok, I went ahead and tried this anyway.

Step 1 - Open Spybot, and look at the left side menu, and select "Tools"

Step 2 - Under Tools, select "Hosts file"

Step 3 - At the top, then select "Add Spybot S&D Hosts list.

It will take a little bit for it to load, depending on your system speed and what else is running, but when it is finished, your hosts file will be fixed right and proper. ;)

See the attached Diagram I made. :)

[The Boinker]

shades- very simple, just delete everything in that file except the hosts file comments in the beginning (so you would be deleting all the IP's and stuff)

loading spybots host file may or may not help, depending on where you found that hijacked file and how your system reads it.....

[phalkon30]

Or just delete the hosts file completely. I've been running for months without it.

A few suggestions for spybot once you get things back to normal, protect yourself from future attacks.

Make sure to do an online update, update program files and/or detections updates.

Then go to immunize in the first tab. Click install for the browser helper, then immunize. This will stop many spybots/adware/spyware/malware things from ever being installed, EVEN IF you click yes to download GAIN.

After that, I would suggest clicking the box below it that says "lock hosts file" (or something similar), and possibly locking your homepage.

By default your hosts file should be at C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc (or whatever you installed windows to). Edit it in notepad, clear everything after the "#" symbol. After that if you want to add things back, I'd suggest the spybot host file, or supertrick from kazaalite.

Alternatively you can just delete the hosts file with no side effects. I preffer to use a popup blocker instead of the hosts file.

[Shades Coolray]

Okay guys, I fixed it, using Phalkon30's delete the host file completely method. I tried using Spybot's host file, but that didn't get rid of the problem, so I went ahead and deleted it and now I can get on all the search engines that spyware program had blocked from the hosts file. You guys really saved my sorry hide this time, I swear I have the most computer related problems than the rest of UTC combined. Anyway, thanks to everyone for helping.:cool:

And as for the evil terrorist spyware\adware monkeys, you all get this ---> :hammered:

[Roadblock]

That's why we are here. ;)

I agree with Phalkon, I would consider now that you removed the old one, to add the one from SB. I should have had you delete all the other entries first, my bad on that. But now that you are clean, I see no reason why you couldn't install the SpyBot version. (In fact, explore all the spybot options, they have some great ones ;) ) But, you can just go without it for now and see how that goes. (I have never tried that) :)

[Shades Coolray]

Okay, I'm using the Spybot hosts file like you suggested RB, and everything is working great. All I need now is a firewall router and I'll be practically invulnerable.:cool:

[-pin-]

i know you got the problem fixed, but here's some more discussion about it:

http://www.wilderssecurity.com/index.php?board=21;action=display;threadid=14604

[MikeHunt]

you need to download a FREE tool that will solve your problem! program is called HIJACK THIS...and its available in the software downloads section @ www.spywareinfo.com

(great site btw):type: