Browser redirects

yammycat

Am getting random browser redirects in ie and firefox, cwshredder says i have cws.therealsearch and that its fixed it every time it runs, though it doesn't fix it, it says its a hosts file redirect, tried to set hosts file to default but it tells me access denied, i am logged in as administrator, have full rights to the file and have taken ownership of the file but i cannot do anything with it as i get access denied (nice work windows)

Is there an easy way to fix/delete this file or should i just go and download a linix boot disk.

mp22

Have you tried doing the removal in safe mode?

yammycat

No, assumed permissions were the same in safwe mode, ill give it a go thx

bhickey

If it's just the hosts file part of the problem that remains and you want to access the host file, save the commands below to a .bat file and run the .bat file in an Administrator command prompt (right-click on Command Prompt and select 'Run as Administrator') :

@echo off
echo,Y|cacls "%WinDir%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" /G everyone:f
attrib -s -h -r "%WinDir%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts"

When the .bat file has run, you should have access to the hosts file again,

yammycat

bhickey wrote: »

If it's just the hosts file part of the problem that remains and you want to access the host file, save the commands below to a .bat file and run the .bat file in an Administrator command prompt (right-click on Command Prompt and select 'Run as Administrator') :

@echo off
echo,Y|cacls "%WinDir%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" /G everyone:f
attrib -s -h -r "%WinDir%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts"

When the .bat file has run, you should have access to the hosts file again,

Thank you that worked, all clean now

Will_H

@yammycat - also, install WinPatrol (it's free) as it will monitor your hosts file for tampering (amongst other things).....