My ISP is now showing up in Firefox

[ErrorMagnet]

Hey guys, I'm using Firefox 3.6.16
About a week ago, I mistyped a url, and I was surprised to see a page sponsored by Charter. This has never ever ever happened before. Do I have some kind of charter malware on my pc?

Here is a screenshot of one of the screens.

And as a reminder, currently I am using Spybot S&D, Comodo AV, superantispyware.
And this is on my laptop. W7 Home Premium.

Any idea how this Charter crap showed up?

 

[catilley1092]

ErrorMagnet, it appears as though your home page settings have been hijacked by some sort of malware. I looked up "is charter web search malware", using Bing, that's what I read.

You can try running the ESET Online Scanner (be sure to run this with IE, as you can fine tune the scanner better).
http://www.eset.com/us/online-scanner

This will give you a really good scan, allow it to clean up whatever it finds.

I hope that it does you good.

Best of Luck,
Cat

 

[brkkab123]

Download Malwarebytes from www.malwarebytes.org. Install it and let it update itself. Also, update SUPERAntiSpyware and Spybot. After all are updated reboot your pc into Safe Mode and run Full Scans with Malwarebytes, then SUPERAntiSpyware and finish up with Spybot. Remove anything any of them find. Then restart Windows again and download HijackThis! and make sure you select Main Menu and click on Do a System Scand and save a lofile. Copy all the text from the logfile and go to the following web address http://hijackthis.de/en and paste the text from the logfile and click the Analyze button. Any results with a red X remove by selecting them in HijackThis! and click on Fix checked. When you do that make sure all web browsers are closed first.

 

[Nibiru2012]

To me you have enough good AV and spyware programs installed already.

Have you tried resetting your homepage? Does it consistently go back to the Charter page if you have tried resetting?

If you're like me and a fast typist, you may have just typed too fast and then hit another wrong key or whatever causing it to become your home page.

 

[etalmar]

Most likely the Charter search portal page is a redirect (or hijack) from your ISP (Charter Communications) whenever you mistype any URL. Any error will automatically take you to Charter's search page, whereby they generate additional revenue by redirecting DNS. There may be a way to opt out of this "service", although I do not use Charter, so I cannot give you specific instructions as to how to go about doing that. Look in some ISP forums for the solution.

This unscrupulous practice is prevalent among several broadband services today, including Verizon, Cox, Charter, Earthlink.

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/81791

http://slashdot.org/story/07/02/15/0432259/Charter-Implements-SiteFinder-Like-DNS

 

[catilley1092]

Sometimes, but not often, when I doing a web search, it'll redirect me to RoadRunner (my ISP) for links. I don't know why, but it does.

SAS is a powerful spyware scanner, if you were infected, it should have notified you after scanning.

Cat

 

[ErrorMagnet]

WOW. Thank you for all the info and suggestions. Okay the ESET online scanner came back clean.

I am going to be reading some of those websites about Charter.
I am performing more scans as I type. I will check back in with results soon.

 

[catilley1092]

If the ESET scanner came back clean, you should be good. I ran it once a week when MSE was my main AV, and was glad that I found it.

If you scan with it regularly, SAS will also keep the computer free of adware & trojans. Plus protect your home page, if you selected that option. Note that some "adware" is actually harmless, as long as you're careful about what you click onto.

Cat

 

[Nibiru2012]

Have you just tried to simply go to the home page you want then make it permanent in the FF4 Options section?

 

[ErrorMagnet]

Have you just tried to simply go to the home page you want then make it permanent in the FF4 Options section?

yes numerous times

 

[ErrorMagnet]

okay went into safe mode, Malwarebytes and spybot came back clean. I also ran hijackthis. I didn't see anything that said charter, but I did enter it into that website, it showed me a few things. I got rid of them,

But I still get the charter window when I mistype a URL.

 

[catilley1092]

That's the same with me, sometimes I get the Road Runner search page. But not often enough to cause concern.

As long as you keep your AV updated & scan regularly, you should be OK. MBAM, SAS & ESET Online Scanner are good to run once a month, too. If you have any bad code on your computer, one of the four would intercept & quarantine it.

Cat

 

[ErrorMagnet]

Thanks guys. I guess I just have to live with it. Thanks for all of your help

 

[TrainableMan]

Your topic says your ISP shows up in Firefox, so is Charter your ISP?

If so then it's very unlikely that it's a virus causing this. Contact your ISP's tech support and explain that their homepage keeps popping up as your Firefox default and even when you set your homepage to something else it keeps resetting to theirs. Tell them you do not like or want them as your homepage and ask how you can permanently change it to something else.

 

[Nibiru2012]

But I still get the charter window when I mistype a URL.

That's the reason right in your statement there. The same thing happens to me if I mis-type a URL in my browser only RoadRunner shows up.

As long as you don't mistype the URL you should be fine.

 

[TrainableMan]

Oh, I think Nibs is on to something.

You must be using your ISPs DNS server. Some DNS servers automatically substitute a predetermined address (such as their search engine) when they detect a 404 Page Not Found. If you switch your DNS server to a public server that returns a true 404 rather than a default webpage then this will remedy what occurs when you mistype an address.