This has been going on for close to three weeks, and it’s driving us nuts. Somehow a site called alfa-search (looks a bit like google) keeps changing itself to our IE homepage. There are no “do you want to make this page your home page?” pop-ups, it just switches itself. I reset mine 2 or 3 times a day, but it keeps happening. It also inserts (the same) half a dozen porn links into our favorites lists, too.
We’ve scaned for viruses, we’ve scaned for spyware and seached the HD for Alfa-search, but nothing keeps it from doing this. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to keep it from doing this? Or any idea what caused it, even?
Read the site first, but HijackThis! is what you need, assuming you used Adaware or Spybot when you said you serached for ad / spyware.
As for where it came from / what causes it? Most likely a program you installed, such as a ‘browser enhancement’ (search bar other than Google’s, etc) or a neat little program you downloaded*. Remember - nothing is free.
*If you have KaZaA / Morpheus / WinMX / LimeWire / Bear Share or company installed, wonder no longer.