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possible malware sites opened

  • 6 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 22 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

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The new firefox should have some malware protection by default? I thought I can use it without blocking addons, maybe a mistake?

On searching the web by google I came on a webpage, where another page suddenly opened and I could not leave with back button. Just another fake page opened.

I scanned the pages here (others are in the comment): https://www.virustotal.com/gui/url/518ffb491d9ae673e803a930d05aae5bd0db9536a93197bfb2a874de76009af2

Could there be some infection? What can I do now to be save?

I deleted cache inside firefox and after that a scan with clamscan. It could not find anything on my device.

Thank you

The new firefox should have some malware protection by default? I thought I can use it without blocking addons, maybe a mistake? On searching the web by google I came on a webpage, where another page suddenly opened and I could not leave with back button. Just another fake page opened. I scanned the pages here (others are in the comment): https://www.virustotal.com/gui/url/518ffb491d9ae673e803a930d05aae5bd0db9536a93197bfb2a874de76009af2 Could there be some infection? What can I do now to be save? I deleted cache inside firefox and after that a scan with clamscan. It could not find anything on my device. Thank you

Modified by cj447

All Replies (6)

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Hi cj447, Firefox does provide some protection against malware with it's built-in Phishing and Malware Protection however, the best Security Software would tell you that there is never a 100% solution. If you think that you've been infiltrated by Malware, here's some tip's to help: Troubleshoot Firefox issues caused by malware

I doubt that you will have any persistent issues, but, if you do - we're here to help.

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Hi, unfortunately Firefox's phishing and malware protection is based on lists of bad sites. Because these scammers keep creating new sites, it is difficult for the feature to keep up. You can report bad URLs -- possibly found in your history -- to Google's SafeBrowsing project:


There are a few common patterns to these annoying pages, and these are some techniques for closing them without having to take drastic measures.

The "key" (ha ha) is the keyboard shortcut for closing the current tab, which is Ctrl+w (or on Mac, Cmd+w). Try it after each action to see whether it is available yet.

(1) Large alert dialog (lots of text)

If you cancel this dialog, it may reappear. After two or three appearances, Firefox should add a checkbox at the bottom of the dialog to stop the site from showing more alerts. Check that box and click OK to block further dialogs.

(2) Authentication dialog (asks for username and password)

If you cancel this dialog, the page may reload and immediately show it again. Pressing the Esc key numerous times in a row can cancel the reload as well as the dialog.

(3) Reacting to mouse movement

Some pages have a script that detects when you are moving the mouse pointer up toward the tab bar and takes action to show another dialog, or moves to full screen view to hide the toolbar area. On these pages, the keyboard shortcut is essential.

Hopefully this will let you close problem pages without having to "kill" Firefox in the Windows Task Manager. (I don't recommend using that method because the tab will come back during automatic crash recovery anyway.)


Often these scam pages are promoted through ad networks. As a defensive measure, you could consider using an add-on that is effective at blocking ads, such as:

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/ublock-origin/

As with any content blocker, this will cause problems on some sites, so keep an eye on its toolbar button in case you need to make an exception to get a page to load properly.

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Go to the Mozilla Add-ons Web Page {web Link} (There’s a lot of good stuff here) and search for a good ad blocker.

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Should I change all my saved passwords in firefox?

That could be hard work ... the firefox master-password was unlocked at the time.

And should I take additional action scan to search for malware?

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If scans didn't turn up anything, you shouldn't have anything to worry about. If it makes you feel more comfortable, you can change just the most critical ones. It's always a good thing to do periodically, anyway.

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This might be related by using Firefox from the Ubuntu repositories.

Try the Firefox version from the official Mozilla server if you currently use a version from the repositories of your Linux distribution.