Imagevenue

So, here's what happened.

I was looking at this thread.

I saw a picture that got my interest. I clicked on the fourth picture in the first post. When I did it tried to install an application on my computer. When I tried to stop it, it shut down my browser, IRC, AIM, and various other Internet programs. It then tried to reset my computer.

I tried to abort it but wasn't fast enough. When I got the CPU back up and running, I had a small red circle with an X over it where Windows alerts normally appear in the bottom right hand corner of my computer. It looked abnormal, however. It also continued to pop up on its own, and any attempt to get information on it caused it to launch.

When it launched it would start a load screen that said, "Installing anti-virus program." It looked suspicious as shit because despite not being a computer master-mind, I am also not a moron. It had no label, was not a command I told it to execute, and it was loading shit without my permission.

I terminated the program each time it started. If it wasn't installed it would continue to pop up a little blurb in the middle of my screen for no reason about once every three or four minutes.

I came back here, made the post above, and then got off the net and called Dell tech support.

They started a shared session with me and looked at it. They said it was indeed malicious and would have attempted to take my credit card information, among other things.

They then offered to take care of the problem and install some shit that would prevent it from happening again. Dell did fantastic for me as they always do - but it did cost me a renewal of my service plan for about $260 bucks.

I now have the appropriate software to defend against this kind of malware, but that doesn't make the existence of the malware okay.

This is also the second instance I've had in the last three months as a result of clicking on links at WhatBoysWant. The other link, about two months ago, was also an imagevenue link - but Dell took care of it for free (which is probably why they wouldn't help me for free this time).

And by the way, the Dell technician was able to confirm that clicking on that picture was indeed the source of my Malware. This is not me guessing. He checked, because... Well because I asked him to and they're cool like that.


The 260 bucks I spent today is a small trade-off to me for what a wonderful community this has been to me over the years (I've been here longer than this account indicates). I have no gripe with giving up 260 bucks as a result of all that I've gotten from this community in that time. The part that bugs me is that it didn't go from my pocket into the site's, but rather it went from my pocket into Dell's pocket because Imagevenue is an unethical, unscrupulous, or incompetent hosting site.


Whatboyswant is in my perception, a clean, safe place for guys to come and talk about that which we love most in the world; girls. I didn't run protection on my computer for a few different reasons, none of which really matter. The fact that my computer was unprotected is pretty moot. It's sort of like blaming someone for getting robbed if they don't lock the door - No, it's the robber's fault; not the home-owner.

Beyond that, I am not the only computer stupid person that comes to this site, nor am I the only one on this site that runs an unprotected machine.

Imagevenue (or clients it hosts) has loaded malware onto my computer at least twice in the last three months.

I'd really like to see WBW maintain its reputation as a reputable gentleman's site.

If I wanted to deal with malicious software and a bunch of other shady shit, I'd go to the channels. I don't. I come here.

I'd like to see imagevenue black-listed. Not just because of what it did to me (which I was smart enough to figure out even if I didn't have the education to do anything about it), but because of what it can do to the other members and the reputation of this community.

For whatever reason, Imagevenue has twice been responsible for infections on my machine in just the last three months (tops). I am probably not the only one.

I'd really like to see this site blacklisted until they acquire some ethics and or get their shit together enough that I'm not afraid to click on links to them.

The other options are that I simply ignore everything posted by people that is hosted on imagevenue (and investigate each link thoroughly so I know whether or not it goes there), or I stop clicking on linked pictures here at WBW.

I have to admit, this really bugs me. I don't want to have to check everything that's linked to on this site before I click on it. I also don't want to be afraid to click on shit in this community. I also don't want to lose a significant portion of the pleasure I get from this community or leave it altogether as a result of it being more work than effort for me to be here.

This site has done a lot for me over the years. Today, I spent $260 dollars as a result of being part of this community (which seems more than fair to me) - but it did not go to the site, the crew, or Diz-x where it rightly belonged.

Please blacklist Imagevenue.

Use NoScript for Firefox to protect yourself from this point on.

As to this current issue, we will start looking in to it.

Thanks, Kanzen.

I have to take off for a bit, but I'll look into the NoScript thing you mentioned when I get back. I've never heard of it before.

Best wishes, gang.

the same thing on the same thread started to happen to me but ESET caught it and killed it thankfully

Well testing with my VM of a fresh install of XP. After the third reload sure enough it tried to download software to my machine. A site titled "getfreecontentnow" tried to inject a piece of software onto the VM machine.

Thanks guys.

As fucked up as this sounds, I'm glad that you were able to confirm my story. I'm not a tech guy, and I know that creates some skepticism sometimes. Thanks for checking on it and as fucked up as it is, I'm glad competent people were able to confirm it.

Reminder: This is twice. The first instance of imagevenue doing this to me was about two months (or so) ago. There is NO WAY IN HELL they've been having this issue for at least two months and are unaware of it. They are either unwilling or incapable of rectifying the matter; and that is the reason I feel they should be blacklisted.

They will be blacklisted in the communities I run as soon as I get back from dicking off today. Hopefully they'll be blacklisted here as well.

I experinced the same problem - only cost me 100 to fix at my local computer guy. I agree imagevenue must go.

I'm certain that GR and I would have much rather spent our collective 360 on two sponsor memberships for a year rather than defense against shady hosts like imagevenue. If I could re-allocate the funds, I would. You guys deserve it more, and imagevenue had no right to take that money from any of us.

Yeah, I know I'm probably beating a dead horse here, but I'm pretty pissed that they took my money. I'd much rather have either kept the money or given it to the site instead of to a recovery specialist who's only going to see about a nickel of that 260 bucks for all the hard work he did for me. I'm sure GR feels the same.

@Tarquin,, Did you pm diz with this ?

thx Tarquin. but maybe i need some information from you friends.
i went there 4 days ago and took those pics, also. no problem for me.

as you know, i surf a lot, take pics, go there - and there, but never saw a problem with this host,
my secure programs don't give a warning there - but they are working fine everywhere else.
so, whats up? i don't understand!

I've had the same problems with this type of crap on the net.

I experience my antivirus-security software disabled with the red "No Smoking" symbol over it and not able to bring up Task Manager or have the ability to execute any kind of command for antivirus, malware, spam, or anything. So looking further into this I had to edit my Registry to access the Task Manager and eventually came to the conclusion of just doing a format and re-install of everything. After being f'd 3 or 4 times I'm having to take extreme measures and precautions for doing things differently in the future like for example creating Ghost images as backups and deploying them over the network when needed.

I don't really have any faith in any type of security software to fix or cure such problems specifically like this one. As I know myself that the system will never be the same after being raped by the payload of some POS creation.

Even though I didn't have to spend any money I do feel that my time is money in my situation for the field of work that I do.

wow, good thing I only clicked on the 5th pic in that thread.


Seriously though, I've noticed that imagevenue has been getting shittier and more annoying recently (especially with that "click here to continue to your image" thing. No shit, fuckstick. I'm only even on imagevenue because I clicked on a thumbnail picture that I WAS INTERESTED IN SEEING IN THE FIRST PLACE! If it has to go for the safety of our members, so be it.

I doubt if it's ImageVenue per-se, it's almost certainly one of their ads. Unfortunately, Imagevenue has adopted an advertising scheme that's too agressive, and they're apparently not adequately monitoring those ads.

NoScript is a Firefox plug-in that allows users to selectively block/unblock JavaScript, which is where popup/popunders/re-directs come from, and how malware is typically distributed.

http://noscript.net/

Hello, Imagevenue.com webmaster here. Please let us know where the virus installation has occurred.

We are trying to track down the advertiser who is doing this.

Did it happen on an intermission page like this: http://img120.imagevenue.com/uploadimg.php.

What is your geo locations.

We are doubtful however that this happened on imagevenue.com. We use adbrite for adverting and they have never had any malware issues with their ads.

Regards
IV support (imagevenue@gmail.com)

Quote:

Originally posted by ivenue

Hello, Imagevenue.com webmaster here. Please let us know where the virus installation has occurred.

We are trying to track down the advertiser who is doing this.

Did it happen on an intermission page like this:[ Link ]

What is your geo locations.

We are doubtful however that this happened on imagevenue.com. We use adbrite for adverting and they have never had any malware issues with their ads.

Regards
IV support (imagevenue@gmail.com)

see first post in this thread

yes, we saw the post, but we need more info on the page the malware has been triggered

Quote:

Originally posted by ivenue

Hello, Imagevenue.com webmaster here. Please let us know where the virus installation has occurred.

As stated, that's specifically addressed in the first post of this thread. You can't get any more specific than that.

Quote:

Originally posted by ivenue

Did it happen on an intermission page like this:[ Link ]

Beats the crap out of me. I'm not clicking on any other links from you guys. I've been burnt twice already, and not for "just a couple of bucks."

Thanks for the apology, by the way. That's sarcasm as your post is absent of any and in fact denies any culpability on your part.

Quote:

Originally posted by ivenue

What is your geo locations.

Central United States.

Quote:

Originally posted by ivenue

We are doubtful however that this happened on imagevenue.com. We use adbrite for adverting and they have never had any malware issues with their ads.

Then your opinion differs from my experience, the experience of at least one or two other trusted members of this community and the support experts at Dell.

To say that "You may be overlooking something and denying something you've failed to take responsibility for as a credible company ought to do" is a generous understatement of profound proportions.

As stated, the issue first took place two months ago. For some reason or another I chose not to say or do anything about it. Today it happened again and if you are who you say you are, you have responded with "Not our fault!" when quite clearly it is indeed your site and your link that is causing the issue.

This is a very unsatisfactory response to a very unsatisfactory situation that your company either had to be contributors to or complacent to ignore.

I am not only a member here and a member of other communities, but I run some sizable communities of my own. Your site is already blacklisted on each of them and hopefully WBW will soon follow suit.

The situation is irresponsible enough, but to exacerbate it with the response (and by that I mean denial of any responsibility) offered in this thread is simply untenable.

Best wishes.

Quote:

Originally posted by waywardson

@Tarquin,, Did you pm diz with this ?

No. I hadn't PM'd Diz, and by now I presume he's aware of the issue (or will be when he sobers up).

I probably should have, but thankfully it got to a crew member anyway.

Quote:

Originally posted by Muad-dib

thx Tarquin. but maybe i need some information from you friends.
i went there 4 days ago and took those pics, also. no problem for me.

Well, as Kanzen and others have said in this thread, it doesn't happen every time the link is clicked. Kanzen wrote that he had to click the link at least three times to get it to try to install the same program on his machine. I doubt it does it every single time or to everyone that clicks the link. It's probably randomized to a small percentage to help hide the source, avoid detection and other reasons of the same nature. I doubt that just clicking "one link one time" would get most people. It's probably not very many people at all (percentage-wise) that actually get the malware attempt to launch.



.

Quote:

Originally posted by Tarquin

...
Well, as Kanzen and others have said in this thread, it doesn't happen every time the link is clicked. Kanzen wrote that he had to click the link at least three times to get it to try to install the same program on his machine. I doubt it does it every single time or to everyone that clicks the link. It's probably randomized to a small percentage to help hide the source, avoid detection and other reasons of the same nature. I doubt that just clicking "one link one time" would get most people. It's probably not very many people at all (percentage-wise) that actually get the malware attempt to launch.

thx my friend. i know this from cheap picture-collector-pages...
"pop-up... pop-up... pop-up... install... no chance to abort... fucked!!!"
but never ever noticed that, at the host we're speaking about....
(by the way: this imagevenue webmaster could give us a proof!)

adbrite put billions of tracking cookies in pcs.


tarquin the same shit happen to me but while i broswe some lame free sampale porn site,this was one of the most annoying virus(s) i ever seen,it took over so many things,had to manuly take care of it.

damn those activeX scripts!