Whenever I click on a google search link, it leads me to a blank page with this URL, "www.goingonearth", what can I do to fix this?
I have a complaint about a bug that'd been annoying me for the past week. When I go on google search engine, I type in what I desire to search for, and then the search engine provides me a list of links. When I click on a link, it leads me to a blank page with this url, "www.goingonearth.com". At first I thought it was just because of a dangerous site, so I clicked on the "back" button to find myself staring at the list of links yet again. So I click on a different link, only to be lead back to "www.goingonearth.com". The links properly work only when I click the icon which provides me a preview of that site, and then I must click on the preview to go to that site. Sometimes I need to go back and click the preview image more than once. This bug has been a problem for the past week. Is there anyway I can fix this?
All Replies (6)
You have a malware infection. Do you have an anti-virus or anti-malware scanning program? If so, run it/them.
If not, head over to Lavasoft and grab Ad Aware: http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php
Or you could try MalwareBytes anti-malware: http://download.cnet.com/Malwarebytes-Anti-Malware/3000-8022_4-10804572.html
I've found both to be good, and they are both free.
Install one of those programs and run a scan. Follow the directions given by the program to remove the malware.
If you do not have an antivirus program, I strongly suggest getting one. There are some free ones available, and there are some decent ones on this top free antivirus and anti-malware programs list: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2361877,00.asp
Novain'i Raine Dragon t@
Try this first. Get Adblock Plus for Firefox, install, and whichever filter subscription you select (I use Easylist) add the offending address to your filter list, in this case goingonearth.com. The problem is a web page exploit that uses pages displaying mixed content by injecting un-encrypted content into the page along with the pages' encrypted content. I recommend this only because I had a similar re-direction problem (different address, but same behavior) because I tried it and it WORKS!
I strongly suggest cleaning up the problem with an anti-virus or anti-malware program and not relying on an add-on to block the effect of the infection. While socalmonk's solution may very well work, it's only hiding the symptoms, it won't actually heal your computer. That's not to say that I don't think Adblock Plus is cool and useful; it's just in this situation it would be like putting a lace table cloth over a pile of garbage. You don't see the garbage, but it's still there.
I tried running AVG 2011 and Malwarebytes, and neither found anything. Also un-installed Firefox and sanitized the un-install, then re-installed. No change. The problem wasn't in my computer, it's a web site infection that exploits a weakness in several browsers...Firefox, Chrome and Opera Mini on my BlackBerry. Maybe others as well. It needs a patch from the browser providers. What I suggested above will work until Firefox provides a security update that allows Firefox users to block unencrypted content on secure pages. Might add that it affected not only my home computer and my BlackBerry, it also affected a laptop that had been sitting in the trunk of my car unused for a month. And the reason I know what it's doing is that I opened the problem website in IE8 and got an IE8 message saying the page contained both encrypted and un-encrypted content. When I selected display all, I was re-directed. When I selected display only encrypted content, all was well. Oh, and it affected Opera Mini on my BlackBerry, a UNIX OS, as well as FF on Windows.
Novain'i socalmonk t@
I did some further research on this specific piece of malware. There is an article here that has some more information about what it is : http://www.mywot.com/en/forum/8429-goingonearth-com-stay-away
and it looks like this person has gotten it off of their computer by following the steps here: http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/topic/290253-google-redirectgoingonearthcom-malware/
All-in-all, this is a pretty sophisticated piece of malware, and if neither of those links help, I'd suggest going to a forum site that is dedicated to fixing computer problems/infections and asking for some more targeted help there. It's something that is beyond my level of expertise to remove.
Outstanding...good find. Thanks!