Recommended Posts

What's the deal with the virus/spyware alert messages that are coming up when I mistype a web address? I recently tried to go to androidcentral.com and must have mistyped part of the address. What came up was a norton anti-virus page with a popup that would not go away no matter how many times I clicked the X. There was also a recorded message saying to call this number as soon as possible. I had to completely close Chrome in order to get the message to go away. Another similar situation happened a while back. A website I was going to had a dash in the address and I forgot to put it in. A loud siren type noise played through the speakers while a virus/spyware alert page was open in a tab.

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1251024-virusspyware-alert-messages/
Share on other sites

What's the deal with the virus/spyware alert messages that are coming up when I mistype a web address? I recently tried to go to androidcentral.com and must have mistyped part of the address. What came up was a norton anti-virus page with a popup that would not go away no matter how many times I clicked the X. There was also a recorded message saying to call this number as soon as possible. I had to completely close Chrome in order to get the message to go away. Another similar situation happened a while back. A website I was going to had a dash in the address and I forgot to put it in. A loud siren type noise played through the speakers while a virus/spyware alert page was open in a tab.

 

It's not actual norton, its just a page using popular AV names pretending to be the actual companies. They are trying to trick you into downloading their program which is malware where you could/will have advertising, popups, keystroke recording and/or ransomware where you will be locked out of your computer and to get it back you will have to pay an online ransom. 

It's common for malware authors to set pages on unclaimed typos of high-traffic domain names, expecting typos alone to drive a decent amount of traffic. You could get a pretty good sampling of how pervasive this is by trying typos of Microsoft.com or Hotmail.com.

 

One of them is a "You must update Flash" page (hint: that installer isn't going to install Flash).

Here are some browser cleanup tools that you can run.

 

 

 

Adware Cleaner                                      http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php
Junkware Removal To...                          http://thisisudax.org/
Adware Removal Tool.                            http://www.techsupportall.com/adware-removal-tool/
Zhp Cleaner                                            http://www.nicolascoolman.fr/download/zhpcleaner-2/
Bitdefender Adware Tool                         http://www.bitdefender.com/solutions/adware-removal-tool-for-pc.html
Avast Browser Clean                               http://www.techspot.com/downloads/downloadnow/5810/?evp=889daefe83afc42bb4f2208c3a3a2fbc&file=1
Black Sheep Anti Rougeware                  http://tazzy.org/
Ohshi Unhooker                                      http://www.oshiunhooker.com/
Software Removal Tool Google-Beta       https://www.google.com/chrome/srt/index.html

I get that these are fake pages setup to trick someone into downloading a fake program setup with a real name (I.e. Norton). Why though are these pages essentially holding the browser hostage to the point that I can't simply close the tab and instead have to close the whole browser? This makes chrome think it crashed, so it offers to reopen the 'crashed' tabs, but I can't do that otherwise I'll be right back on the same offending tab.

I get that these are fake pages setup to trick someone into downloading a fake program setup with a real name (I.e. Norton). Why though are these pages essentially holding the browser hostage to the point that I can't simply close the tab and instead have to close the whole browser? This makes chrome think it crashed, so it offers to reopen the 'crashed' tabs, but I can't do that otherwise I'll be right back on the same offending tab.

 

if you wanted to force someone to download your crap, you would make it that way too :)

  • Like 2
This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Posts

    • Quantum Error Correction Validated in Nature: Microsoft and Quantinuum Log 800-Fold Improvement Two years after the original press-release announcement, independently peer-reviewed results published in Nature on June 10, 2026, have confirmed that Microsoft and Quantinuum achieved an 800-fold reduction in quantum error rates on real trapped-ion hardware — the largest gap between physical and logical error rates ever independently validated.    What Quantum Error Correction Actually Does — and Why Breaking Even Is Hard https://www.techtimes.com/articles/318329/20260613/quantum-error-correction-validated-nature-microsoft-quantinuum-log-800-fold-improvement.htm   Quantum Computing Wiring Bottleneck Cracked by HKU Silicon Carbide Chip at Qubit Temperature Engineers at the University of Hong Kong have built the first cryogenic control chip that operates at the same temperature as superconducting qubits — 10 millikelvin, or just one-hundredth of a degree above absolute zero — without generating the heat that has forced every competing approach to park its electronics hundreds of meters of cable away. https://www.techtimes.com/articles/318325/20260613/quantum-computing-wiring-bottleneck-cracked-hku-silicon-carbide-chip-qubit-temperature.htm  
    • RevPDF 4.5.0 by Razvan Serea RevPDF is a free, fully offline PDF editor for Windows, macOS, and Linux that lets you edit text and images directly inside PDF files — no internet connection, no account, and no cloud uploads required. Unlike bloated alternatives that demand subscriptions and constant connectivity, RevPDF fits in under 60MB on desktop while delivering a complete editing toolkit: annotate, redact, sign, compress, split, merge, convert, and reorganize pages, all processed locally on your device. Smart font matching ensures edited text blends seamlessly with the original, and multi-language support includes RTL scripts such as Arabic and Hebrew. Where most PDF editors force you to choose between features and simplicity, RevPDF manages both. You can build interactive forms from scratch with text fields, checkboxes, and dropdowns, permanently redact sensitive data before sharing, draw freehand on contracts and diagrams, and add custom watermarks — all without a single file leaving your machine. Edit Text and Images Directly Inside PDFs RevPDF supports true inline PDF editing — not just annotation layers on top of a document, but actual modification of existing text and images within the file. A smart font-matching engine identifies the font used in the original document and applies it automatically when you make edits, so changes blend naturally with the surrounding content. You can reposition elements, resize images, and update text across single pages or entire documents. RevPDF 4.5.0 release notes: This is one of the biggest updates to RevPDF yet. A lot of things people have been asking for are finally here. New Features Auto Redaction Permanently redact sensitive text and areas from your PDFs before sharing. Clean, irreversible, and fully offline. Comments, Links & Bookmarks Add comments for review, insert clickable links, and create bookmarks to jump around long documents without scrolling forever. Find & Replace Search across the whole document and replace text in one go. Long overdue. Split Pages Vertically or Horizontally Split any page down the middle, vertically or horizontally. Perfect for scanned books or double-page spreads. New Drawing Tools More tools for freehand drawing and markup, better for annotations, sketches, and detailed notes. Continuous Scrolling in Editor The editor now scrolls continuously through pages instead of jumping between them. Working through long documents is a lot smoother now. PDF Metadata Editor View and edit the metadata stored inside your PDFs, including title, author, subject, and keywords. Better Font Matching Text edits now blend in more naturally by doing a better job of matching the original font. Tabbed PDF Viewer Open multiple PDFs at once in tabs and switch between them without going back to the home screen. Add Links Insert hyperlinks anywhere in your PDF, to external URLs or to other pages within the document. Share & Print Shortcuts Share or print directly from the editing screen, home screen, and viewer. No extra steps. Minor Updates Paste images directly from clipboard into your PDF New image editing tools for more control over images inside documents Bug Fixes Fixed file saving issues on Windows and Linux Everything still works fully offline. No login, no cloud, no account. Your files stay on your device. Download: RevPDF 4.5.0 | 58.0 MB (Open Source) Links: RevPDF Home Page | Github | Screenshots 1 | 2 Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
    • Interesting. I'm not using a VPN with my phone. I tried though my home internet (Rogers) and my cellular internet (Telus) using their respective DNS servers and both trigger the dialog above.
    • Three days after Anthropic launched Claude Fable 5 as the most capable AI model it had ever released to the public, the United States government ordered it switched off — and now the company is refunding customers who paid to use a product that vanished almost overnight https://www.techtimes.com/articles/318342/20260613/us-government-pulls-anthropics-fable-5-offline-now-come-refunds-vanished-ai.htm  
    • Microsoft fired the team and replaced them with AI and this is what you get.
  • Recent Achievements

    • Week One Done
      agatameier earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      agatameier earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      ssd21345 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Contributor
      MarkHughes4096 went up a rank
      Contributor
    • Dedicated
      jordanspringer earned a badge
      Dedicated
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      507
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      175
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      139
    4. 4
      ATLien_0
      90
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      76
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!