Firefox 3.6.4 uses a custom google search??
I updated Firefox and now it's using a google custom search in the built in box instead of a standard google search. This fills the top half of the page with an adsense block, removes all the menu navigation from the left side (as seen on the new google search) and kills the top menu bar as well (for image searches, etc.) How can I get around this and get back to a normal google search again?
This happened
Every time Firefox opened
== I updated firefox an hour ago
All Replies (9)
Have you tried reinstalling Firefox, ch676?
Also, can you please email me this file (if you're on windows):
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\searchplugins\google.xml
That's the default good search engine. No information is stored on it, obviously, and you yourself can check. Please email it to me at tiago.morbus.sa@gmail.com
Hopefully that'll help me and Mozilla understand if there's something wrong with the update itself. Thanks in advance.
the hijacked google seacch page is in that XML file
http://www.google.com/cse?cx=partner-pub-3540673482024757%3Ac8hkjv-9xef&
the XML file
Google Google Search UTF-8 data:image/x-icon;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABAAAAAQCAIAAACQkWg2AAAAGXRFWHRTb2Z0d2FyZQBBZG9iZSBJbWFnZVJlYWR5ccllPAAAAaRJREFUeNpiVIg5JRURw0A0YAHio943kYV%2B%2Ff33%2BdvvX7%2F%2FMjEx8nKycrGzwKXOiPKzICvdeezLhCV3jp15%2Bfv%2FX0YGhv8MDDxMX2qKTIw0RK10eYD6QYqATvoPBkt3f5K0W9Ew4fjTFz%2F%2Bw8Dm3W8UPeZxqFa%2BevsFyD0twgfVsOfkRxHrtfV9u5BVQ8Crd98%2FffkGYQM1QJ20%2FfSPv79eNxQGYfpSVJADmcvEAHbr7oOX2dj%2FERNKIA2%2F%2F%2Fz%2FxfCDhYVoDUDw5P6vf9%2B5iY0HVmZGQWm%2BN3fff%2Fn2k4eLHS739x%2FDiRs%2Ff%2F%2F5x8HO%2FOHzN3djfqgNjIwMgc6qzLx%2Fpy47j2zY%2Feff06tXhOUucgxeun33AUZGpHh4%2Bvo7t8EyIJqz%2FhpasD59%2B5dNrqdnznZIsEL9ICXCsWuBCwvTv%2FymS5PWPP32ExEALz%2F%2BB5r848cPCJcRaMP9xaYQzofPPzfuvrnj0Jst%2B5%2F8%2Bc4sLPeDkYlRgJc93VPE18NIXkYUmJYQSQMZ%2FP3379uPH7%2F%2F%2FEETBzqJ0WqLGvFpe2LCC4AAAwAyjg7ENzDDWAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg%3D%3D http://www.google.com/cse?cx=partner-pub-3540673482024757%3Ac8hkjv-9xef&
how can i remove this ?
I tried changing the url values in the xml file but it doesn't seem to make any difference...
@igrigori, your issue has to do with Peerblock, not Firefox. Same thing happens on Fx 3.5.7. You can read more here. Rolling back won't help.
So does anyone know what this custom search is? Is it malware? I got the same thing after Firefox updated today or yesterday.
http://www.google.com/cse?cx=partner-pub-3540673482024757%3Ac8hkjv-9xef&
I tried resetting the search engines and reinstalling firefox. So far the only work-around I've found is to use the Google English addon.
I have the same URL (with the cse?...) in FF 3.6.7. Noticed it today after the auto update of FF.
http://www.google.com/cse?cx=partner-pub-3540673482024757%3Ac8hkjv-9xef&q=foo&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t
Yeah it's weird. It happened to me about a month ago when FF updated. I ended up using the Google English search for a while. I forget how, but I fixed it a few weeks ago. Then it updated today and the problem is back. This time I investigated it a bit more on forums and such.
I fixed it by editing the google.xml file (somewhere in prog files/firefox). There's a line there that lists this custom search url, so I changed that back to regular google. That didn't fix it right away, so I deleted search.json from my profile folder. A restart of FF rebuilds the file, and that fixed the problem for now.
It's weird. I've seen a bunch of people with this problem in the past few months, usually occurring after an update. Some have suggested the cause is malware, although a quick scan on my machine hasn't found anything. I don't know, but I would expect google to do something about it if their customer was spreading malware to make money from ads (the ID 3540673482024757 belongs to price-advisor.com).
Disabling the FVD(Flash Video Downloader) Toolbar Add-On took care of this problem completely for me. All back to normal now.
Modified by ADCX_Rob