http://localhost opens online pharmacy website

[gabrieleit]

Hi!

2 days after installing XAMPP I got an adware "warning youre're in danger". I have removed the adware from my pc but now everytime I open http://localhost I get redirected to a canadian pharmacy online store or other pharmacy stores.

I made many researches in the internet but I could'nt find anything related.

Is anybody able to help me?

Thanks
Gabriele

[Sharley]

Open in your text editor C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\Hosts file and add a comment hash # to every entry other than 127.0.0.1 localhost

Save the file and try your http://localhost again.

You may have to right click on Notepad and select run as administrator if you are using Vista.

Unless you have added other entries yourself then you only need the 127.0.0.1 localhost entry in the Hosts file.

Your adware may have added lines to the Hosts file as part of it's agenda and if your hosts file works now you have commented out the other entries then it is safe to delete those other entries except of course the 127.0.0.1 localhost entry.

[gabrieleit]

Hi Sharley!

I checked that first but the host file looks ok

I have only the localhost and localhost.localdomain lines

127.0.0.1 localhost
127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain
127.0.0.1 activate.adobe.com

[Sharley]

Clear your browser's cache (delete Temporary Internet files and offline content).

Also search your registry and PC for the pharmacy link and delete if you find it.

[gabrieleit]

I cleared everything last night and everything was fixed.
Today I have uninstalled ad-aware and now the online pharmachy comes up even if I delete all the cookies.

Adaware found 2 malware last night while we were posting here. I removed them and I also cleared all the saved files from both google chrome and firefox, fixing the problem.

Thanks!