Edit: Folks, I keep telling you it’s VERY unlikely to be malware.

I’ll update you and apologize to each if my credit card gets wiped or something but I’m quite sure I’m safe, don’t worry.

Also sorry for blaming Microsoft for what is apparently my fault.


I accidentally clicked Microsoft Edge on my work computer with Windows 10 and couldn’t close it — it just keeps reopening. It takes File Shredder to stop it from opening again, at least until the computer restarts.

Notice the ads, most are extremely sketchy (my frequent reload in previous takes caused the ad server + my work VPN to rate limit me):

  • China warns: %user.currency% is dead! (Yeah, sure. Obvious propaganda. Generic pictures or faked images of a worthless banknote giveaway.)
  • 63-year-old figured out! (Does not say what but a pic of obviously young-looking feet.)
  • Make boatloads of money with AI! (aka auto-trade very uncompetitive options, no guarantees on withdrawals of any wins)
  • Save money using solar! (The company is legitimate but the deal on panels is probably not great)
  • Buy yourself a great new FPCEILPTBSP! (You can’t tell what it is and neither can we! (Apparently TV wall mount))
  • Losing hair?
  • Millionaire has genius method you can try (but give us money first, making his pic transparent so we can put him in front of %user.country.flag% was difficult)
  • Game! Yay! (Microtransactions galore!)
  • Get EVERYTHING in your car fixed (by a stock photo mechanic!)
  • @ChaoticNeutralCzechOP
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    27 months ago

    I’ve had a similar thing happen before, Firefox kept opening several blank tabs every second. That time, the cause was a little more obvious: it kept calling itself to open a PDF because I had misconfigured it. I suspect a similar thing happened here – I did try to remove Edge, which may have broken something.

    Rather than reinstall and reconfigure everything, which takes 4 hours I’ll just do an ESET virus scan and reset some relevant config. I don’t do personal stuff or banking on that computer anyway so I don’t think I’m really in danger.

    • unhappy_grapefruit 2
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      37 months ago

      Whatever works for you although if I was put in a smiliar scenario it’s better to be safe than to be sorry

      • @ChaoticNeutralCzechOP
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        17 months ago

        Thanks, finally someome who understands (I don’t mind that you disagree, lots of people IRL do)