Solved My Chrome gathers junk images

I was fighting with a malicious scammer in a gaming forum, and suddenly one of my Facebook picture albums started having new random images on its own. About 50 images just uploaded itself into an album out of nowhere.

After looking more carefully, they were images from many sites I had open in my browser tabs (e.g. a logo from a Lighthouse website, etc.). I have a habit of keeping as many as 10-20 tabs open in a browser. When I checked the other tabs, the same was happening, a website banner was replaced by an image from my Facebook album, etc. Also Chrome ran significantly slower.

My Firefox was perfectly fine.

I closed all browsers and ran a full scan with McAfee. It showed 0 virus.
Then I opened my Chrome again (with the same tabs), and ran a full scan once again. Still showed 0 virus. Turning off or restarting the computer doesn't help. And all this happened 3 days ago, and since then my Chrome is still like that.


Can anyone please help me?

And is it true that such a bug can be deliberately sent to a person's browser?



Thank you.
 

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First of all, please don't post two threads with the same problem, it makes it difficult for us to help you if different people start helping you on each of them offering different (and sometimes conflicting) advice. If you put it in the wrong catagory, just add another post asking to have it moved, one of the admins will take care of it :)

Now, firstly run a full scan with Malwarebytes (allow it to update if it asks you to when you first run it), it tends to find a lot of stuff other systems (especially McAfee) miss, including adware and other things: Malwarebytes : Free anti-malware, anti-virus and spyware removal download this will makes sure you don't have any remaining viruses/malware on your computer.

Secondly, is there a persisting issue? You said it just uploaded a lot of pictures to your facebook, is it still constantly doing that or is there a different issue? Basically, what are you trying to fix?

It is definitely possible to intentionally send a bug to someone's computer. Whether or not that happened here, I don't know. I think it's more likely you either unintentionally managed to do put those pics up yourself (pretty unlikely though), you visited a site that in some way caused this to happen (in which case Malwarebytes should find and fix whatever it put on your computer to allow that), or maybe one of the Apps that you've used on Facebook caused it to happen. (you should review the ones that you have allowed/used on facebook and delete any that look suspicious or you don't use anymore). Or it could be a thousand other things, there isn't enough info to tell yet. But we'll start there. Run malwarebytes and tell me exactly what you want me to help you do. :)
 

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System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 1545
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Duo T6400 @ 2.00 GHz
    Motherboard
    DELL - 27d90219 Phoenix ROM BIOS PLUS Version 1.10 A05
    Memory
    4 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Mobile Intel(R) 4 Series Express Chipset Family
    Sound Card
    IDT High Definition Audio CODEC
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Generic PnP Monitor (DPMS), 15.3" (34cm x 19cm)
    Screen Resolution
    1366x768
    Hard Drives
    Internal 320 GB
    Portable 320 GB used for separate storage of media, plugged into USB port as needed.
    Cooling
    Single built in fan
    Keyboard
    Built in
    Mouse
    Touchpad, + Logitech wireless mouse (USB)
    Internet Speed
    ~150 kilobytes/sec DL
    Other Info
    Usually have low HD free space left (<10 GB), often left on overnight. I really push its capabilities.
Thank you very much, Slammer,

I'm sorry I didn't know about the posting habits in the forum (and I wasn't sure whether to put this in Browser or Debugging, so I put in both).

I am not very adept with computers; I'll try what you just advised, but if I have questions that sound stupid later, please forgive me.

And to answer your question : the persisting problem is I am still seeing misplaced images in some sites (a regional Facebook ad showing a picture from my album, a person's avatar in a gaming forum is an image from one of the sites I have open in a tab).

Also my Chrome runs slow, things that are heavy fail to download now.

I've deleted the random 50 images that uploaded itself into my Facebook picture album, moved my own pictures to a new album, and then deleted the old album. Since then no random pictures showed up by itself in an album again.

And about why this happened : I did not unintentionally upload the 50 pics myself, as they are not my personal pics, they are logos from sites that I have open, a forum banner, someone's avatar. As for visiting sites, I didn't visit a new site that day, seriously. And I don't go to shady sites or hack sites, and whenever I do click a link to a shady site, somehow my McAfee doesn't let me go there, and being not very adept in computers, I don't know how to bypass my McAfee. As for Facebook apps : I am neat about it, if I try something that I don't like, I remove after 1st try. So I always only have 3 apps on my Facebook.



Thanks, Slammer. Will try the Malwarebytes and write here again what happens.

:)
 

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It's ok, you're new here so we don't worry about it, just for future reference :)

And don't worry about "stupid" questions, they're usually easier to answer anyway!

If scanning with Malwarebytes doesn't fix it, (and if Firefox works as normal like you say) then try clearing Chrome's cache- Delete cache and other browsing data - Google Chrome Help . If it still persists, uninstall and reinstall Chrome. If it's still having problems after all that then we'll do use a system restore. But one at a time :)

I know you wouldn't have accidentally upload 50 random pics off the internet by yourself, I'm just thinking it might have been a click-jacking type thing. Although it's also possible you accidentally logged into a fake facebook site (depending on how you usually get into facebook that might not be a possibility) but again that's probably not very likely anyway. I can't really think of a realistic reason that would have happened though, unless it was just an incredibly huge glitch in Chrome. So hopefully that little issue won't come back.

As for McAfee, if you ever really want into a site it's blocking, there should be a "visit this site anyway" button in tiny text somewhere on the warning screen you get. Just for future reference.

Glad to help :)
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 1545
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Duo T6400 @ 2.00 GHz
    Motherboard
    DELL - 27d90219 Phoenix ROM BIOS PLUS Version 1.10 A05
    Memory
    4 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Mobile Intel(R) 4 Series Express Chipset Family
    Sound Card
    IDT High Definition Audio CODEC
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Generic PnP Monitor (DPMS), 15.3" (34cm x 19cm)
    Screen Resolution
    1366x768
    Hard Drives
    Internal 320 GB
    Portable 320 GB used for separate storage of media, plugged into USB port as needed.
    Cooling
    Single built in fan
    Keyboard
    Built in
    Mouse
    Touchpad, + Logitech wireless mouse (USB)
    Internet Speed
    ~150 kilobytes/sec DL
    Other Info
    Usually have low HD free space left (<10 GB), often left on overnight. I really push its capabilities.
Oh yay, thank you very much, Slammer!

:) I ran Malwarebytes and it still showed 0 infected. Then I cleared Chrome cache "since beginning of time," closed browser, reopened, and everything loads normally now, no messed-up images.

About McAfee : yes, I do always see the "visit the site anyway," it isn't in such tiny text actually. But whenever I click it, nothing happens, as if the thing weren't clickable. I'm serious. I thought there must be some setting somewhere that was set as really high, that I needed to adjust, but I couldn't find it.


Patch41 : Thanks also! :)
 
Last edited:

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Great, I'm glad you got it fixed!

And as for the McAfee button, that sounds like a glitch with your browser. Probably some sort of "minor" incompatibility. You might try using it with a different browser, like IE, and see if it works there to be sure. (I know IE is like the bane of browsers nowadays, but I use Firefox and know that SiteAdviser isn't compatible with that, so IE is the easiest to test on) An alternative would be to disable it if not being able to access a site ever becomes a problem (as I know it likes to block some download sites that are generally safe) If it's a real issue, you can start another thread about it and we'll try to come up with a solution to it! Or maybe just tell you it can't be fixed haha :)
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Inspiron 1545
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Duo T6400 @ 2.00 GHz
    Motherboard
    DELL - 27d90219 Phoenix ROM BIOS PLUS Version 1.10 A05
    Memory
    4 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Mobile Intel(R) 4 Series Express Chipset Family
    Sound Card
    IDT High Definition Audio CODEC
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Generic PnP Monitor (DPMS), 15.3" (34cm x 19cm)
    Screen Resolution
    1366x768
    Hard Drives
    Internal 320 GB
    Portable 320 GB used for separate storage of media, plugged into USB port as needed.
    Cooling
    Single built in fan
    Keyboard
    Built in
    Mouse
    Touchpad, + Logitech wireless mouse (USB)
    Internet Speed
    ~150 kilobytes/sec DL
    Other Info
    Usually have low HD free space left (<10 GB), often left on overnight. I really push its capabilities.
Thanks Slammer! :)

I might post about that the next time I run into a blocked site again, as it is hard to describe with any certainty when I don't have the thing with me now.

You guys are wonderful and very helpful, this is really great, thanks a lot!


:)
 

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