George Costanza
A Friendly Liberal
Last week I found this Web site where you could download free music - or so I thought. The name of the site is "Bear Share," perhaps you have heard of it? It is one of those p2p music sharing sites patterned after the original Napster site. I located and down loaded an album I was after. Well, I didn't really download it, I guess. What I did was make it available on my computer so I could play it from their Web site. Frankly, I am not totally sure of what I did - but of this, I am sure:
After listening to the music and going to a few more Web sites for other purposes, I closed my browser. The next time I opened it (I'll bet some of you already know what is coming), my Google home page was gone, and I was looking at a Bear Share home page. No problem, I thought - this has happened before. I quickly navigated to Google and then went to Tools/Options and clicked on "Make the current page my home page." All fixed, right? WRONG! Next time I activarted my browser, there it was again: Bear Share home page.
I was a victim of the dreaded home page hijack! Ever have that happen to you? It happened to me once before, about six years ago and I still remember what I had to go through to get my home page back. It involved downloading three or four programs, registering at a malware message board where dedicated people pulled me through it and venturing into the registry to do things I knew nothing about. Very scary stuff.
Well - guess what? I fixed the problem myself! Without having to do all that again. The fix was relatively easy and did not take that much time - although it took a bit of time, about half an hour. My browser is Firefox. The fix did not require me to go into the registry. It did not require doing anything with add ons nor anything else involving Firefox settings.
Can anyone guess what the fix was?
p.s. - NEVER go anywhere near the "Bear Share" site. Avoid it like the plague.
After listening to the music and going to a few more Web sites for other purposes, I closed my browser. The next time I opened it (I'll bet some of you already know what is coming), my Google home page was gone, and I was looking at a Bear Share home page. No problem, I thought - this has happened before. I quickly navigated to Google and then went to Tools/Options and clicked on "Make the current page my home page." All fixed, right? WRONG! Next time I activarted my browser, there it was again: Bear Share home page.
I was a victim of the dreaded home page hijack! Ever have that happen to you? It happened to me once before, about six years ago and I still remember what I had to go through to get my home page back. It involved downloading three or four programs, registering at a malware message board where dedicated people pulled me through it and venturing into the registry to do things I knew nothing about. Very scary stuff.
Well - guess what? I fixed the problem myself! Without having to do all that again. The fix was relatively easy and did not take that much time - although it took a bit of time, about half an hour. My browser is Firefox. The fix did not require me to go into the registry. It did not require doing anything with add ons nor anything else involving Firefox settings.
Can anyone guess what the fix was?
p.s. - NEVER go anywhere near the "Bear Share" site. Avoid it like the plague.
Last edited: