I'm getting something very strange with Firefox lately: unexpected words 
in web pages (such as "form" on a Wikipedia page) show up as links.  If 
I click the link I get taken to an advert.

Refreshing the original page makes the link disappear.

A scan with an up-to-date Norton Antivirus of my whole system asserts it 
to be clean.

Has anyone else seen anything like this?

Mac OS 10.4.11, Firefox 3.6.27.  I haven't yet noticed the same thing 
with Safari.

Paul Magnussen

Paul Magnussen wrote:

Sorry, I meant to put a question mark after the original title -- I 
don't know if the problem actually is a virus at all.

Paul Magnussen

In article <rcmdnUs_pMZpDsLSnZ2dnUVZ_omdnZ2d@earthlink.com>,
 Paul Magnussen <magiconinc@earthlink.net> wrote:

> I'm getting something very strange with Firefox lately: unexpected words 
> in web pages (such as "form" on a Wikipedia page) show up as links.  If 
> I click the link I get taken to an advert.

Yes, I have seen such things. 

What happens when you turn off javascript in your FF browser?

What is the difference between the markup, css, js source of an 
example page when compared between FF (where it happens) and Safari 
(where it does not happen).

type into the URL bar of your FF

about:addons

and see what addons you have. Disable them and see what happens.

-- 
dorayme

dorayme wrote:
> In article <rcmdnUs_pMZpDsLSnZ2dnUVZ_omdnZ2d@earthlink.com>,
>  Paul Magnussen <magiconinc@earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
>> I'm getting something very strange with Firefox lately: unexpected words 
>> in web pages (such as "form" on a Wikipedia page) show up as links.  If 
>> I click the link I get taken to an advert.
> 
> Yes, I have seen such things. 
> 
> What happens when you turn off javascript in your FF browser?
> 
> What is the difference between the markup, css, js source of an 
> example page when compared between FF (where it happens) and Safari 
> (where it does not happen).
> 
> type into the URL bar of your FF
> 
> about:addons
> 
> and see what addons you have. Disable them and see what happens.

Godd suggestions; thanks.

I'll get back again when I've tried them all.

Paul Magnussen

Paul Magnussen wrote:
> I'm getting something very strange with Firefox lately: unexpected word=
s=20
> in web pages (such as "form" on a Wikipedia page) show up as links.  If=
=20
> I click the link I get taken to an advert.
>=20
> Refreshing the original page makes the link disappear.
>=20
> A scan with an up-to-date Norton Antivirus of my whole system asserts i=
t=20
> to be clean.
>=20
> Has anyone else seen anything like this?
>=20
> Mac OS 10.4.11, Firefox 3.6.27.  I haven't yet noticed the same thing=20
> with Safari.

I've seen it a few times in SeaMonkey 1.1.18, but never in Firefox. I=20
don't know, but I guess it might be one or the other kind of=20
incompatibility between the browser and the webpage. If you can find it=20
try to upgrade to Firefox 4. This version will also run fine on 10.4.11.

Cheers, Erik Richard

--=20
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Erik Richard S=F8rensen, Member of ADC, <mac-manNOSP@Mstofanet.dk>
NisusWriter - The Future In Multilingual Text Processing - www.nisus.com
OpenOffice.org - The Modern Productivity Solution - www.openoffice.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On 03-13-2012 14:37, Paul Magnussen wrote:
> I'm getting something very strange with Firefox lately: unexpected words
> in web pages (such as "form" on a Wikipedia page) show up as links. If I
> click the link I get taken to an advert.

This is an Javascript-driven advertising method used by a lot of websites.

Some sort of artificial stupidity scans the text and associates words 
with advertisements.

Refresh forces the Javascript to rescan the text in order to add the 
links  It takes a while to do because (I think) some of the work is done 
back at its home planet).

If it is consistently on certain pages and not on others, then it is 
somewhat well-behaved.  If you see it on pages where you don't expect 
it, it may be that it was sneakily bundled with some other add-on.

A couple of URIs ?

-- 
Wes Groleau

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible
will make violent revolution inevitable.
                 — John F. Kennedy