Quatloos!

Whenever I surf over to check out quatloos lately, up pops an announcement from my anti virus software that it just blocked an intrusion attempt. This has been happening for several days. Just passing it on.

Not to be annoying, but are you sure it's from YOUR virus software. There's a lot of scareware on the net that does pop-ups looking like your own (or Microsoft's own) virus detectors, and it tells you that you are riddled with viruses and click here to scan your memory more fully; clicking loads up ransomware that pretends to find a zillion bits of malware (if it shows you what is supposed to be your file directory you'll see a whole lot of files that contain your name in the filename - even though you don't name files that way - because that display is completely bogus) and then the software says you MUST immediately buy, with your credit card, such-and-such program you never heard of to clean out the malware - and it won't budge from your screen. If you restart the damn thing is still there. (Some of this is being done from foreign countries and it's very convincing. But if you pay, you may get a remedy program that simply undoes their own trojan -- or you may get nothing for your money and your computer stays frozen, go try to find them.)

My one protection is, the very instant I see that first pop-up pretend warning screen, I restart and then immediately start up my real anti-virus anti-malware programs, one right after the other, to clear out that pop-up for good. If need be, I go to a restore point.

fortinbras wrote:My one protection is, the very instant I see that first pop-up pretend warning screen, I restart and then immediately start up my real anti-virus anti-malware programs, one right after the other, to clear out that pop-up for good. If need be, I go to a restore point.

Excellent advice.

I appreciate the suggestion, but it is actually from my anti virus software. It happens instantaneously every time I try to look at the first page of the forums. It does not ask for me to pay for "protection" from them (the internet equivalent of a protection racket) and I know what you are referring to. I actually use anti virus software with a Mac for a reason. But the problem persists here, and I find that odd.

Which software are you using?

I log in at least a couple of times per day, am running both fully-updated McAfee (home) and Malwarebytes (office), and have never had a warning.

Wonder if it's hitting on the anti-anonymous software? None of mine do but it's possible.

I also log in a few times a day, am running AVG and Malwarebytes and have never had a warning.

I have not seen any warnings, on my computers at work or at home.

Not getting any warnings here. I just checked the rendered source on all the themes as well as ran diffs on the actual template files and there's nothing there that would cause the problem.

Exactly what page is generating the problem? Please copy and paste the url. Also, is there any way you can paste the log here? If you don't feel comfortable posting it publicly, you can PM it to me. I know you mentioned that it was your anti-virus throwing the error, but I suspect the firewall since it would also block an intrusion attempt, so if you don't see it in the AV logs try the firewall logs.

JamesVincent wrote:Wonder if it's hitting on the anti-anonymous software? None of mine do but it's possible.

We don't have anti-anonymous software but we've got some anti-hacker protection which has a side-effect of sometimes blocking people using an anonymizer service (due to hackers abusing said service). It would just display a 403 error, not try to hack the originating computer.

I also get no such warnings and I have three anti-virus programs on my PC. Is it possible that your Windows set-up made the Privacy or Security levels too tight? Is this happening to you with other websites?

fortinbras wrote:I also get no such warnings and I have three anti-virus programs on my PC. Is it possible that your Windows set-up made the Privacy or Security levels too tight? Is this happening to you with other websites?

It would be super weird for the Windows privacy and security levels to be too high on a Mac.

I have encountered this issue a few times in the past.

All were traceable to user atavars or embedded pictures (links) which had the original source corrupted.

AndyK wrote:I have encountered this issue a few times in the past.

All were traceable to user atavars or embedded pictures (links) which had the original source corrupted.

I actually can see that, I've had that problem on other websites but not here.

Webhick wrote:We don't have anti-anonymous software but we've got some anti-hacker protection which has a side-effect of sometimes blocking people using an anonymizer service (due to hackers abusing said service). It would just display a 403 error, not try to hack the originating computer.

There's a couple on anti-whatever programs that advertise virtual identity protection by logging you onto a website through a VPN. If our software is kicking it out it may cause a false virus warning was what I was thinking. Like I said I've never had that kind of problem here, just the very random server not found.

AndyK wrote:I have encountered this issue a few times in the past.

All were traceable to user atavars or embedded pictures (links) which had the original source corrupted.

He mentioned that it's happening on the front page of the site, which I take to mean the forum. We don't have any off-site pictures on the front page of the forum.