pop up ads without IE running?

[Broadkipa]

I have just encountered a strange problem on my sons PC. We keep getting pop up ads all the time even thought Explorer is not running, just at the desktop. somtimes as many as 10 have been on screen at the same time. I have run an anti-virus program and brought up the task manager to see if there is anything ther running that should not be there.Cant see anything obvious. where the hell can this programe be hiding to keep running in the background like this. I have also run MSCONFIG to see what is running at startup but of the few programs listed there they are all OK programs. Help! this is driving me nuts, I have had 4 pop ups since typing this message.
OS is Win XP home with all the latest updates including SP1

 

[redbeard1]

What OS are you running?

 

[OZEE]

Are they popups or are the messenger-service dialogs? If they're messenger boxes (NOT MSN messenger) that's a new form of spam. Search this forum for help in shutting that off.

If it's not messenger boxes, try running the new AdAware 6 and getting rid of that spyware.

 

[filmore crashcart]

If your firewall is not enabled in your dialup/properties/advanced, then your wide open for uninvited solicitations. I ocasionally will take down my firewall so that a friend across the country and I can play games together. If I forget to re-enable the firewall, I'll start getting popups for university degrees and penis enlargers...... [cough, cough] neither which I really need.

 

[Broadkipa]

I have downloaded Adaware and will install it when my son has finished watching a film. What I don't understand is how a programe can open an IE window and display an advert without showing a sign of where it is running from and without me enabling it. I am not happy about this as I am suffering myself with increasing amounts of spam mail. These people are stealing my bandwidth and that costs me money. Anyway enough of the ranting and thanks for your help, I hope to get to the bottom of this soon.
PS I have a cable router and have scaned my PC using a program on the web and my pc is invisble to the outside world, so it tells me.

 

[Broadkipa]

Well ran Adaware and it came up with loads of spyware etc. could not belive how much junk there was on his computer. It was a fresh install just before Xmas. cured the pop ups, great program and shall be scaning now on a regular basis.

 

[lbmcleod]

Yeh the reason you are getting all the crap is not being careful enough about what you download/subscribe/opt out of.

A fresh install of IE fixed the prob with this on my machine, if you want to stop the "messenger service" boxes (not MSN messenger, just NET SEND type things sent from an outside spam programme) then either being behind an NAT network will do it, or set your router, h/w or s/w firewall to block ports 135, 137 and 139 on incoming traffic only to stop all access via "RPC" and netbios port scanning.
This shouldn't stop you sending messages on a local-network level.

If you dont have a firewall/router that can be adjusted in this way, then you can stop ALL messaging (this will disable any local messaging too though) by typing services.msc in Run box, change the startup type of "Messenger" to diabled.

 

[DanTMWTMP]

1 word...ADAWARE....

download from here

 

[Broadkipa]

Thanks for all your replys, Adaware did the trick, no more pop ups.

 

[TrentReznorNIN]

I bet it was cause of kazaa or kazaa lite... Even though they claim that lite has no spyware, it is the only thing I installed on a new install and I encountered the same thing.

The people that invented popups, popunders, and all the rest of that crap deserve a good kick to the beanbag.

Just my two cents.