Help: Browser Hijacker Removal?

[Haltickling]

Somewhere in this endless internet galaxy, my computer caught a nasty little program which keeps hijacking my homepage, setting it to "about blanK", or to msn.com (on ie6) / Netscape.com (NS 7.1).

I have tried Lavasoft ad-aware and webroot spybot, but they obviously can't remove this beast. It seems to be some CoolWeb tool, so I used CW Shredder, too, to no avail.

Can anybody help me, please? I don't know much about computers, and now I'm helpless.

PS: My comp works on Windows 98 SE.

 

[nellen]

Browser hijacking

Haltickling;

I think you may have to re-format your hard drive. I recently had the same thing happen to me and I tried everything you have plus more and I couldn't shake the hijack program. The computer tech. who did the reformat/repair said that is the only effective way to eliminate it. Just make sure you have your stuff backed up to disc.

It is a real pain, because you get booted from secure sites among other things. Good luck in fixing that.

Nellen

 

[Haltickling]

Thanks, Nellen. I'm afraid I'll have to do this, too. All virus and spyware removal systems have failed. Damn hackers!

 

[TKpervert]

Try this:

"To fix this nastiness manually, search your computer for *.hta files. Click Start and Search or Find and then Files or Folders and type in *.hta. If you find them rename them so that they can't be found. For example, change file.hta to file.hta1 or move the files to another folder on your computer. Then switch your homepage back to one you like. If your computer doesn't do weird things after this permanently delete them. If it does, you might want to put them back one by one until you find the offender and then delete it."

I scanned my C drive and found two: privacy.hta and wmptour.hta, so these are probably ok. I'm running XP Home.

 

[Haltickling]

Hm, no .hta files on my comp. Probably because the system is different (W 98 SE). Thanks anyway!

 

[TKpervert]

Hmm, you're right, I cranked up my Win98 backup machine and it doesn't have any .hta either.

Here's another idea: http://www.spychecker.com/program/hijackthis.html
Then go to
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/index.php?showtutorial=42 to read the warnings and sort of learn how to use it.
Might be worth a try since you may have to reformat anyway.

It's freeware and works with Win98.