Virus popups unbearable

What I still don't understand is why I only get redirected to those dead end pages when I am logged in. If I am logged out, I still see the ads all the same, yet never get redirected.
 
So, you're saying that the site is now unusable unless you pay? Because it's not just a pop up occurring, it's a total hijack of the entire page , that requires a "registered user" to log out and come back. It seems like they should just require people to pay to use the site, then or at least be up front about the tactics they're using if what you are saying is correct.
 
I don't believe you grey, because it never happens on my desktop. So, you're incorrect. You claim you can't stop it unless you're a paid member, it's intentional, yet it is stopped on the desktop.
 
Plus it's claiming your phone is infected with virus, the thing will be damaged unless you do what we want! What in the heck does that have to do with advertising? What would happen if you clicked and installed the app they want you to install, is you'd have a virus, you seem to be saying bladeforums is using sneaky underhanded methods to get people to pay now. I'd suppose they make something off the advertising too, so you're not making sense.
 
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jill jackson said:
I don't believe you grey, because it never happens on my desktop. So, you're incorrect. You claim you can't stop it unless you're a paid member, it's intentional, yet it is stopped on the desktop.
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Still real lousy for those of us that only use phones 100% of time, my guess this is why entire forum is not as active as it used to be. Probably not renewing my membership, especially if even basic members are still getting the popups. I havent gotten any popups but I'm still gold, for awhile.

How long has this been happening?

The amount of spam threads the last month or two is down right ridiculous.
 
jill jackson said:
So, you're saying that the site is now unusable unless you pay? Because it's not just a pop up occurring, it's a total hijack of the entire page , that requires a "registered user" to log out and come back. It seems like they should just require people to pay to use the site, then or at least be up front about the tactics they're using if what you are saying is correct.
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No. I'm only relating facts as I have experienced personally and those experienced by my Son as recently as yesterday. Whether or not the site is 'unusable' or not is an opinion that each person must determine his or herself.
The redirect feature is recent and it is a royal pain. Junior was quite frustrated with it. Said it happened every third post and there was nothing that could be done except log out then log back in. If one can handle that then I suppose that is the new joy of the Registered User status. It's nothing new across the internet. Other forum sites withhold certain Vbulletin features such as Editing Posts or Search options up until you purchase some type of membership. BF is merely catching up with the times. There's things you get for free and there's things you get for joining. If 'Redirect' has made the site unusable then consider a membership. A Basic Blade Forums membership is $10. Ten bucks. That's it. Think about it. There's Coach and there's Business and there's First Class. All get to fly on the same plane. All get to the same place. Just some get more amenities and thus the trip is more enjoyable. Bottom line Jill, if you want to play you're going to have to pay.
$10 and it all goes away.
Now did BF admin fully realize that this is a new feature that is being thrust upon its registered users when they made some of these new advertisement decisions?
Do moderators randomly log out and just open up the site as regular internet users to see what's going on from a site visitors perspective or a registered users viewpoint? Does Mr. Kevin Jon Schlossberg? I can't tell you that but if not maybe they should consider it. IMHO, the site offers a tremendous amount of satisfaction and should be supported financially based on those offerings rather than Force Selling Memberships as an incentive to avoid irritating pop ups but again that is just my opinion. Blade Forums does sell services as noted that each membership level has increased amenities as the membership price goes up. Increased PM box capacity. Custom Usernames. Bigger Avatar Pixels, Seller Advertising, Exchange features, etc. All for sale right here just depends on what the user wants. And at this moment if the user does NOT want pop ups or redirects, $10 makes it all go away.
On the other hand it won't take too many redirects for some people visiting BF for the first time to just move on. And if increased Paying Membership is the goal here then this is not a sure fire way to achieve it regardless of what the sales dept has been told.
 
I just let my gold laspe on October 17th, so since then. I always let it go awhile before I renew, I don't mind the stationary ads, but this pop up and take over the entire page is ridiculous.
 
Well, grey you don't know and you're speaking out of turn. In other words let Spark speak for himself. You have no more idea than any other person, besides the owner. And like I stated, I don't get it on my desktop, so you are wrong about having to pay. :rolleyes:
 
jill jackson said:
Plus it's claiming your phone is infected with virus, the thing will be damaged unless you do what we want! What in the heck does that have to do with advertising? What would happen if you clicked and installed the app they want you to install, is you'd have a virus, you seem to be saying bladeforums is using sneaky underhanded methods to get people to pay now. I'd suppose they make something off the advertising too, so you're not making sense.
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No. I did not say that at all. Let's just deal in facts for right now leaving all speculation aside for the moment.
Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant Jill. Turn on your fone. Log onto BF. What happens?
And if you are not satisfied with what happens buy a membership. The cheapest one is $10.
Go back to the top of this very page.
Fact: All of those posting that they are experiencing this redirect irritation are blue registered users. And all those stating they are not experiencing it are Paying Members. Those are facts presented right here in this thread. What do those facts tell you?

As far as being redirected to a site that states that your computer has been infected that is just a BS website trying to sell you some anti viral or scan ware nonsense. You should have some type of Spam ware protection on your own computer that will confirm the accuracy of that redirected web page claim. When one is redirected they are no longer on BF but are now on another website independent of BF. And there is nothing to say that those websites are accurate or in turn deceitful.
Anyone reading this can log off and reopen Blade Forums without logging back in and see the ads pop up within seconds AND if they are using a smartfone they will be most likely redirected to a site such as you discribed.
It's not our place to declare this right or wrong but it is what it is. And the fact remains if you join it goes away.
But hey don't take my word for it. I didn't op this thread so obviously something new is occurring and other people are experiencing it.
And as I posted earlier I just renewed last week and I was getting redirected and when my gold went into effect that stopped. I also posted that the photo sharing site Photo bucket has been using redirects for years and the moment you join it stops.
This redirect is Not a virus and where one gets redirected to from here is Not a BladeForums feature but part of an advertisement firms mo that has recently become apparent on this website
 
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It goes away right now, on my desktop and you have no idea why this is happening, you're guessing like everyone else. If the owner comes on here and says what you're saying then yes it's true, until then you shouldn't be saying you absolutely know. Because you're wrong about not being able to stop it, you can stop it by using a desktop. And phones come with virus protection, as far as should have it's already on mine. It doesn't prevent a pop up though, it might keep a virus off IDK, I'm not clicking on the install to find out.
 
Greykilt said:
It's not our place to declare this right or wrong but it is what it is. And the fact remains if you join it goes away.
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Imo, it's wrong, and will deter MANY people, there is no way I would have put up with this when originally joined as a registered user, I would have left and never came back. Would never have upgraded to gold. Believe this is going to cost them $, rather than make it. Many free knife forums still to go to.
 
ryan.ororke said:
This happens on my phone as well, has been happening for a week or so now. I can't even browse the exchange section for more than 1 minute, before I get redirected. I have Lookout running on my phone,...
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jill jackson said:
I tired everything and they come right back. I cleared all cookies, reset the phone, removed all apps. I didn't have to have, scanned it with cleaner antivirus remover. It only happens on BF, no where else ever. So. I'm just not getting on here with the phone anymore, because I can't stop it from taking over the page and it won't go away until I close it down. And besides if you reset the phone and they still are coming back on here and only here what does that say?
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jill jackson said:
It never happened to me either, until my gold expired, so seems the ads here are doing it.
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jill jackson said:
It goes away right now, on my desktop and you have no idea why this is happening, you're guessing like everyone else. If the owner comes on here and says what you're saying then yes it's true, until then you shouldn't be saying you absolutely know. Because you're wrong about not being able to stop it, you can stop it by using a desktop. And phones come with virus protection, as far as should have it's already on mine. It doesn't prevent a pop up though, it might keep a virus off IDK, I'm not clicking on the install to find out.
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...sigh...

I'm done. You are posting one thing then coming back and countering it. I said point blank in my initial post here (Post #8 above) that my Son had this problem yesterday on his Samsung Galaxy Smartfone but when he used the hotel PC ( A Desktop Computer) he had no problem. As you posted, let admin answer the op. But as it stands right now this is Not a virus, this is why virus protection doesnt stop it, anymore than a flu shot prevents pregnancy, phone users are redirected and joining as a member stops it.
$10 and it's gone. You can deny this or you can fix it. Up to you.
 
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My point is are registered members not just seeing ads on the page, or ads saying they've won a gift card, but the phone users are being hijacked and by a page that requires them to either download an unwanted app, or log out completely. That's it nothing else, just the you have a bunch of viruses and your phone is damaged bull crap. Not the ads , or the Walmart gift card stuff.
 
It may be that the site does not prevent scripts in the posts from running. This is quite common in forums. If someone enters a script in a post, any browser that loads that page will interpret the script as active content and execute whatever the script is. A person wouldn't have to even look at the post. As long as it's on the page somewhere, the script will run. This is a security setting in the forum software. Is there any correlation to the last update of the forum software? Perhaps something was missed in the settings.

Just a thought.

P.S. There is more malware written for Android then there ever was for Windows.
 
jill jackson said:
It goes away right now, on my desktop and you have no idea why this is happening, you're guessing like everyone else. If the owner comes on here and says what you're saying then yes it's true, until then you shouldn't be saying you absolutely know. Because you're wrong about not being able to stop it, you can stop it by using a desktop. And phones come with virus protection, as far as should have it's already on mine. It doesn't prevent a pop up though, it might keep a virus off IDK, I'm not clicking on the install to find out.
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The next time this happens, PM me with the URL of the page that caused your phone to redirect. I'd be curious to look at the contents of that page.
 
If it's a sitewide script that has to be turned off and should, good luck with that.

I hear some folks are waiting months on end for t-shirts, stickers, patches, membership upgrades...

I understand the wheels grind slow with so many requests, but...SMH.

As far as cross-platform testing... Who are we kidding? Lolllll. I used to do that as a job (cross-platform translation/compatibility) and I can assure you that is being done minimally here, if at all.

The tools have gotten better to minimize things like this, but no matter what, you will have some groups left out or having problems.
 
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To me, it sounds like a XSS vulnerability. I wonder what patch level the vBulletin software is at?
 
Well, it makes no sense bladeforums would actually want some users to get an entire page, saying their phones are infected and damaged and you must install free virus protection. From what I've read it's actually tracking cookies that can steal your financial information, such as credit card numbers. That is what I am saying isn't right, not the ads or even the gift cards, which I have been able to merely close out and continue. The virus warnings you must log out and back. Malware should not be tolerated on any legitimate site.
 
netguy1999 said:
To me, it sounds like a XSS vulnerability. I wonder what patch level the vBulletin software is at?
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A level in which a Smartfone cannot guard against whereas a PC seems to be less 'vulnerable'. This redirect also exists on other forums running the identical redirect to a
'WARNING VIRUS DETECTED' page. Photobucket and USN are doing it right now as well but only to existing regetered users. On the PC the pop ups show up as separate tabs so are unseen until one logs of Photobucket. On the Smartfone they redirect the current page. Been like that for a few years. Same exact thing happening here on BF now.
 
jill jackson said:
Well, it makes no sense bladeforums would actually want some users to get an entire page, saying their phones are infected and damaged and you must install free virus protection. From what I've read it's actually tracking cookies that can steal your financial information, such as credit card numbers. That is what I am saying isn't right, not the ads or even the gift cards, which I have been able to merely close out and continue. The virus warnings you must log out and back. Malware should not be tolerated on any legitimate site.
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That's why I suspect the vBulletin software may have an unpatched vulnerability.
 
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