My web browser is being redirected to unrelated and malicious web sites?

Question

I am having trouble browsing the Internet. When I use my search engine (i.e. Google, Yahoo) to find websites and click on a provided link, my web browser is redirected to unrelated or malicious websites. It occurs randomly and the redirected website is always different (advertisements, fake anti-virus sofware, pornography). To access the desired webpage, I have to press back and re-click on the link several times. I contacted my anti-virus software company (Trend Micro) and they searched my entire computer but found nothing. They concluded that the malware is affecting my DNS server, which is why I am being redirected. They advised me to contact my ISP (Verizon) and obtain some sort of username and password. Does this make sense to anyone? I have two other computers in the household and none are experiencing the problem. Could I solve the problem if I reset my wireless network ID and passphrase? This is so frustrating. I have used the Trend Micro software, Hijack this, Malware Bytes and Spybot but nothing was found. Thanks in advance.

† Oh yeah · Accepted Answer

Try turning off JavaScript and surfing the internet in safemode to see if you still get redirected on that computer. 

It could be possible that one of your computer is infected with some type of malware that is currently not on Trend Micro, Malwarebytes and Spybots database.

Brian · Answer

I've been working on a similar problem for the last two days.  It was a rootkit infection.  Usually a program called "Combofix" deals well with these, but no luck this time.  A rootkit finder called "Gmer" helped me locate the offending file, which turned out to be an infected Windows system file in the system32 folder: "ws2_32.dll."

Try Combofix first; download and follow the instructions here:
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/combofix/how-to-use-combofix

If you're still being redirected after this process, go to "C:&#92;WINDOWS&#92;system32" and find "ws2_32.dll."  Close all browsers and rename the file "ws2_32.dll.BAK."  Now you need to find a clean version of the same file.  Downloading from the internet may not be safe or easy, so I suggest copying the file from someone else's clean computer running the same OS version.  You should also check your "C:&#92;WINDOWS&#92;system32&#92;dllcache" folder and rename the same file in the same way if it's in there.  (You don't have to put a clean copy of the file in there though.)

Good luck!

Anonymous · Answer

You have a browser hijacker. Download and install Spyware Doctor.

thunder6371 · Answer

You have a Hijacker Virus, your computers linked together? the virus may be in your router

th3PCGuru · Answer

Try these also:

http://www.filehippo.com/download_cwshredder/

http://www.filehippo.com/download_rootkit_revealer/

http://www.filehippo.com/download_superantispyware/

Good luck.

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My web browser is being redirected to unrelated and malicious web sites?

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