Ads appearing in lower right hand corner of posts?

September 1, 2013 8:30 PM

Starting this morning, I have seen sporadic ads in the lower right-hand corner of the screen while reading posts on MeFi and Ask, even while logged in. They display first as a grey and orange bar, like so; when I hover over the bar, it expands into a set of ads (for "coupons" nominally linked to keywords in the post). Have I been hit with spyware, or is this happening to others? (I am running Chrome on Windows 7; this is definitely not a browser extension I have installed.)
posted by jeudi to Bugs at 8:30 PM (7 comments total)

That isn't anything done on our end, I would suggest doing a malware scan of your computer, maybe checking your browser for unwanted extensions?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:30 PM on September 1, 2013

That's something in a Chrome extension. I'd disable them all, re-enable them one at a time until you find the culprit. I'd also run MalwareBytes Anti-Malware from my profile.
posted by deezil at 8:45 PM on September 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

In case you didn't know, deezil knows everything.
posted by Melismata at 8:55 PM on September 1, 2013 [11 favorites]

Superfish may be to blame. Do you have the Translate Selection extension installed?
posted by unliteral at 9:16 PM on September 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

If you're really sure it's not a browser extension, there's a possibility that your ISP decided to start injecting their own ads. Enable secure browsing in your MetaFilter preferences and if that makes the ad go away you might have found the cause.
posted by Rhomboid at 10:01 PM on September 1, 2013

unliteral: It was indeed Translate Selection! I suppose I should have done some Googling/not been so quick to dismiss the extension possibility before frantically posting here. Thanks so much, everyone -- mods, you can close this now.
posted by jeudi at 8:35 AM on September 2, 2013

Yeah, almost definitely a rogue extension, or malware.

If, however, you start noticing advertisments for "Matt's Online Gentrified Bicycle And Spare Parts Store", then that may be a little different...
posted by Wordshore at 10:54 AM on September 2, 2013