Active X attacks on ATS

I have several pretty good security programs (which I'm not going to name), and for the first time ever on ATS, I have had attempted installation of Active X based somethings-or-other.

My programs blocked this and informed me that something was trying to install itself. Since it's never happened before I am guessing this was an attempted attack.

Has anyone else experienced this?

i had the same experience. it could be a rouge advertisement because it only happened on one page and when i refreshed it went away. it also notified me it was trying to open a pop up.

It happened twice in under a minute. Once in the John Lear forum, and once on the main page.

By a rouge ad, do you mean one that has not been authorised by the 3 amigos?

not necessarily unauthorized, but an ad thats not working correctly. all those ads are tracked to claim credit for the forwarded link, its possible there was just a scripting error.

edit: grammer

[edit on 2/28/2007 by bokinsmowl]

hmmm. Maybe

With all due respect, do you know that or is it a guess?

I know Active X is good way of transmiting a virus...

im a network engineer with an mcse, ccse, and rhdba... but im not sitting infront of their system. i can only give my assumption based on the symptoms i had. so no, i do not know for sure.

We have a new, higher-end service providing banner ads, 24/7 Real Media, that we are currently testing. If all goes well, they will be a much improved source of better quality ads on ATS -- with fewer annoying ads.

However, some of their ads may include Flash and/or streaming broadband content that may trigger ActiveX to install or upgrade Flash. What was the nature of the ActiveX alert? It's used for a broad range of benign processes including the installation of plug-ins and other completely normal activities in IE.

it is very possible its aliens or a govt' conspiracy............... or both!

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
What was the nature of the ActiveX alert? It's used for a broad range of benign processes including the installation of plug-ins and other completely normal activities in IE.

I'm not entirely sure, the message just said that the program has detected and stopped the installation of Active X based software.

I'm no expert but I'm trying to find the log file to see what it was.

your program is probobly set to medium or high security which will block unsigned java scripts and all active x installs... it asks you if you want to install it first. it didn't install, so i wouldn't worry about it until you come across it again. usually you can right click that active x alert on top of firefox and ie to see what info it has on it. after market programs will usually just block generically and throw up a standard alert.

No I've had have a good look around and I can't find what it was

You are probably right Skeptic, just a benign process. It happens occasionaly on other sites but this the first time it's ever happened here so I assumed it was aimed at me.

Ok panic over, thanks for your input anyway guys

Originally posted by bokinsmowl
it is very possible its aliens or a govt' conspiracy............... or both!

Aliens? I was going to blame bigfoot...

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
We have a new, higher-end service providing banner ads, 24/7 Real Media, that we are currently testing. If all goes well, they will be a much improved source of better quality ads on ATS -- with fewer annoying ads.

However, some of their ads may include Flash and/or streaming broadband content that may trigger ActiveX to install or upgrade Flash. What was the nature of the ActiveX alert? It's used for a broad range of benign processes including the installation of plug-ins and other completely normal activities in IE.

Hi SO,

I don't mean to be rude, and I know you need Ads for revenue, but there's nothing more annoying than those animated flash adds and stuff.

That's why people get things like "Adblocker" and "AB-Plus" extensions to install as Firefox plug-ins.

I don't mind a thin panel on the right hand side with some ads, but the more insidious the ads become the more it's going to turn people off.

In fact dial-up users are, istm, going to experience delays while these things try to install stuff.

Would purchasing a 'low-bandwidth' version of ATS help, by removing all this stuff?

Is there somewhere that you could show a .jpg of what the low-bandwidth version looks like so people can try that out before spending a lot of ATS points?

TIA. BTW, nice job on the board so far. I just hate intrusive ads.