ghacks Wants Edge – FF Browser Update to View – hack/redirect

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[CraigS26]

EDIT: 7 times this occurred for me this a.m. and the minute I post … it starts working. Sorry ….

Can someone try the ghacks.net link — ghacks.net to confirm you get a brief page view and THEN a page with — You need to Update Your Browser to View Contents — with an Update FF / Update Edge button. It’s highly unusual WHEN BOTH browsers show Current … BUT the URL IS the correct ghacks address vs odd characters you’d expect from a Bad Guy Site.

W10 Pro 22H2 / Hm-Stdnt Ofce '16 C2R / HP Envy Desk-Ethernet - SSD-HDD/ i5(8th Gen) 12GB / GP=2 + FtrU=Semi-Annual + Feature Defer = 1 + QU=0

• This topic was modified 2 months, 1 week ago by CraigS26.
• This topic was modified 2 months, 1 week ago by CraigS26.
• This topic was modified 2 months, 1 week ago by satrow.

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There is now an item about this on their site, reporting a hack of ghacks.

3 users thanked author for this post.

Charlie, satrow, CraigS26

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I’ll copy the current message from Martin here, with a little Bolding added:

Earlier today, we noticed a security issue on the site that showed a malicious intermediary page to visitors. This page asked visitors to update their browser to continue viewing the content.

There may have been different messages, depending on the web browser used. Firefox users, for instance, may have seen a “you need to update your browser to view the content” notification and an “update Firefox” button on the page.

We reacted quickly to the security issue and have resolved it. The investigation is still ongoing and we are still in the process of validating the site’s databases and content.

We would like to ask anyone who interacted with the malicious content to scan their systems with up to date antivirus software. Some options include Bitdefender Antivirus Free, Avast Free Antivirus or the built-in Microsoft Defender on Windows.

We will share additional information on the issue once we have completed the investigation.

4 users thanked author for this post.

lmacri, Cybertooth, CraigS26, Alex5723

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THANKS for the update! I only SAW the update page – did NOT click the button – but am scanning anyway.

W10 Pro 22H2 / Hm-Stdnt Ofce '16 C2R / HP Envy Desk-Ethernet - SSD-HDD/ i5(8th Gen) 12GB / GP=2 + FtrU=Semi-Annual + Feature Defer = 1 + QU=0

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satrow

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Below is more info on what was seen when visiting the ghacks website:

https://malwaretips.com/threads/ghacks-net-website-delivering-malware-via-fake-browser-update-messages.125969/

I rarely go there anymore and was not aware of the issue (long ago deleted my browser bookmark for it) since after it was sold to Softonic the quality of the content started to drop dramatically and many new authors were added where most of their articles read like they were created by AI. There was also the issue with the comments section frequently getting messed up and showing old comments from previous or other unrelated articles, not to mention the annoying cookie consent that would always overlay the entire screen and had to be acknowledged (or deny all cookies which took more effort) before able to see the site.

So this is just one more reason not to visit the site anymore. It’s rather sad as it used to be one of the top tech websites.

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Charlie, satrow, SueW, oldfry

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No need to drive people away – yet!

I visit almost every morning but since the Softonic takeover I nearly always drop in via the Latest Posts page as it’s much less grimy than the new home page – I think many of the old regulars also use it as their landing page.

Can’t offer much hope for the mess that’s the recent Comments ‘system’ except to mention how nice it is to see the odd new article with accompanying topical comments as a reminder of how useful they used to be.

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Alex5723

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