Getting browser hijacked on startup

[Marcia]

I must have picked something up without knowing it, when I boot and start up Internet Explorer I get taken to one of a few sites I know nothing about - directory type garbage.

When I make the change in IE back to normal start page it's OK again - until I have to start up again, then those turn up.

I have to go through this each time on start-up. How do I get rid of that, it's really invasive and annoying.

[PatrickDeese]

[lavasoftusa.com...] has a list of approved sites for downloading their Ad Aware program.

There are some other progs that are more "in depth" but adaware is the easiest to use, IMHO.

[bpresent]

I do some work on other people's PCs (to supplement meagre income) and use both AdAware and Spybot [safer-networking.org]. They often find different things and seem to catch just about everything.

If you're using Windows 2000 or XP (and nothing but - and it's for "home" use) you may want to consider installing Sygate firewall [download.com.com]. It takes a little while for you to identify (and tell it via "Y/N" responses as things come in and out) what is good and what is bad but worth the trouble.

Also, use Mozilla with pop-ups and selected scripting switched off (keep IE for google tool bar and nothing else) and you should be well protected from worms and spyware.

(By "nothing but" I mean... From reading other people's opinions about this firewall I reckon that there can be conflicts with some other heavy duty background processes - so far I have had no conflict with the built-in XP firewall and I am using wireless too - which also has a firewall). (I sound paranoid!)

[mat]

Do a search for 'hijackthis' - it's been mentioned a couple of times here, and should flag any offending start-up and registry entries that may be causing problems with browser hijacking.

That's assuming that adaware or spybot don't sort things.

[ukgimp]

spybot should sort you out. I find it better than Adaware, catches more.