536970 - Spam pop-up windows keep opening.

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[andrewdanner]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.6) Gecko/20091201 Firefox/3.5.6 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.6) Gecko/20091201 Firefox/3.5.6 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

Spam pop-up windows keep opening in a new firefox window while i am browsing. Incentaclick and "hotebar.com" are two of the windows. All pop-up windows are advertisement windows, or dating sites. Have used Windows Security Essentials, AVG, Avast Pro, as scan/removal tools, but even after 'removing' the problems, firefox is still being infiltrated and continues to open up pop-up windows. I have set my privacy and security settings to block pop-ups, and am using Adblock Plus and Ghostery as firefox add-ons. 

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Open web browser
2. Type in website i want to go to
3. Browse for a minute or two, and a new firefox window pops up every time with a new ad.
Actual Results:  
Every time I have a firefox browser window open, regardless of whether or not i'm actually browsing, eventually a new pop up window opens with an annoying ad.

Expected Results:  
I was hoping that firefox would block any pop-up.

Comment 1

[Kevin Brosnan]

Do you get the popups by just visiting a page? 

Do the popups appear when you interact (click) with the page, like what is done at http://www.snopes.com ?

Would you provide the addresses of pages where you run into this sort of issue?

Do you get the same sorts of popups if you run Firefox in its safe mode? new profile? clean reinstall? all are explained in http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Basic+troubleshooting

Comment 2

[andrewdanner]

(In reply to comment #1)
> Do you get the popups by just visiting a page? 

There are a few different scenarios where a pop-up window opens. 
1. As soon as i open the firefox browser. 
2. When I make any kind of action, such as clicking a link, hitting the "reply" button on an email, etc.
3. When the computer sits idle with a firefox browser open for any period of time. Sometimes I'll have left the computer with a firefox browser open, and come back an hour later and there will be 20 different advertisement pop-up windows opened.

> Do the popups appear when you interact (click) with the page, like what is done at http://www.snopes.com ?

Yes, when I click on just about anything on a page I will get a popup. It doesn't happen every single time I click on something, but the longer i'm on the internet, the more frequent the occurences during actions such as clicking on links, or navigating between tabs.

> Would you provide the addresses of pages where you run into this sort of issue?

Sure. Here is a list of some of the pages the new popup windows are directed to:

http://cellphoneincentives.com/rd_p?p=190513&t=12097&c=&a=99181

http://www.gamevance.com/?lp=223&a=280&aid=2359-AM4&clickid=00039V0qJZLZ1jv49a7Z6qMkML000000&ce_cid=00039V0qJZLZ1jv49a7Z6qMkML000000

http://network.kitaramarketplace.com/click/?affiliate_id=2359&site_id=935&creative_id=21817&merchant_id=1567&program_id=2769&campaign_id=7617&dp=0023nJ0000001jv49a7Z6qMkML000000&ce_cid=0023nJ0000001jv49a7Z6qMkML000000

http://off.freeze.com/survey/chriscount/?a=11052&f=CD1176%20&&subid1=33473&

http://register.freeze.com/Download/index.aspx?s=chriscount&c=2622268&SessionId=e0aae10e-1cb4-4aff-89f0-3705249bfa35&fn=CD1176

http://register.freeze.com/index.aspx?s=chriscount&c=2622268&SessionId=e0aae10e-1cb4-4aff-89f0-3705249bfa35&fn=CD1176

http://network.adsmarket.com/click/imJpmWHKe52NaHLEXsp6w4xkcZ1moqmdjmhxxGKefp23ZGybYqI

http://www.gamevance.com/?lp=225&a=280&aid=2359-AM4&clickid=00039N0qJpJ91jv49a7Z6qMjsb000000&ce_cid=00039N0qJpJ91jv49a7Z6qMjsb000000

/click/?affiliate_id=2359&site_id=935&creative_id=21993&merchant_id=1567&program_id=2769&campaign_id=7793&dp=0025nl0000001jv49a7Z6qMjsa000000&ce_cid=0025nl0000001jv49a7Z6qMjsa000000

http://www.hotebar.com/ (this site almost ALWAYS pops up in a new tab on almost all of the annoying popup windows)

those are all of the sites that have popped up so far, today.


> Do you get the same sorts of popups if you run Firefox in its safe mode? new
> profile? clean reinstall? all are explained in
> http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Basic+troubleshooting

I will try to start in Safe Mode again, but last time i used safe mode, i still had the same problems. Will repost once i've attempted in safe mode.

Comment 3

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Can you please try downloading malwarebytes anti-malware and run that?

Comment 4

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Reporter, are you still seeing this issue with Firefox 3.6.13 or later in safe mode? If not, please close. These links can help you in your testing.
http://support.mozilla.com/kb/Safe+Mode
http://support.mozilla.com/kb/Managing+profiles

You can also try to reproduce in Firefox 4 Beta 8 or later, there are many improvements in the new version, http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/all-beta.html

Comment 5

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

No reply, INCOMPLETE. Please retest with Firefox 3.6.13 or later and a new profile (http://support.mozilla.com/kb/Managing+profiles). If you continue to see this issue with the newest firefox and a new profile, then please comment on this bug.