Help! Have I been hacked, strange error message appears on my web browser!?

Hi all.

I need some advice, I logged onto my PC just ten minutes ago. As usual I came straight onto ATS as I do most mornings to see the latest posts. As I looked through the threads I entered the Enigma-amginE thread. Then I checked the Enigma page and tried entering a few numbers in the text box at the bottom with no success.

BUT then, my browser froze up and I recieved an error message:

firefox.exe - System Error
The maximum number of secrets that may be stored in a single system has been exceeded. The length and number of secrets is limited to satisfy United States State Department export restrictions.

What the hell does this mean? I live in the UK btw.

Then, I rebooted my pc and now I must re-activate windows within 3 days.

What the hell is going on?

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


LOL, looks like it's part of the game itself. Nothing to worry about - except that you may have solved more of the game

haha, owned.

(or not, im not clicking the link to check for myslef thanks )

ok.

go to control panel

find system restore

choose a date to rollback your system to (before the hack)

let it do it's magic

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


Smells like a virus. It probably reset your admin password etc. too.

Get a good malware scanner and AV update/good antivirus installed.

Good tools (free) are like: Adaware and spybot, if you are familiar with computers HijackThis is a good one.

For AV I generally recommend f-secure.

Good luck :/

Can you do a rollback and restore? Also run spybot.

reply to post by Kryties



What the hell kind of game is that? lol, being hacked doesn't seem like much fun to me...

Originally posted by Beavers
haha, owned.

(or not, im not clicking the link to check for myslef thanks

)

ok.

go to control panel

find system restore

choose a date to rollback your system to (before the hack)

let it do it's magic

edit on 21-9-2011 by Beavers because: (no reason given)

Thanks for the advice, I will do that.

A virus just activated on your computer. Probably came in a video codec you downloaded recently - it just activated.

Cant remember the name. Run something, quickly!

i doubt it was the game, ive been all up and down in it and nothing

Originally posted by lordtyp0
reply to post by Wide-Eyes

 

Smells like a virus. It probably reset your admin password etc. too.

Get a good malware scanner and AV update/good antivirus installed.

Good tools (free) are like: Adaware and spybot, if you are familiar with computers HijackThis is a good one.

For AV I generally recommend f-secure.

Good luck :/

Excellent advice, thanks for all the freebie scanners. I will try thos because I am intrigued as to what caused this. If they fail then I will system restore.

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


You haven't been hacked mate.

You entered some codes on the game website and then got the error - logic dictates you have stumbled onto part of the game (judging by the error code you got - I've never seen anything like it so I assume it's part of the game).

Think about it - why would Firefox talk about letting secrets go to the United States State Department? It makes NO sense unless it's part of the game.

Originally posted by Wide-Eyes
Hi all.

I need some advice, I logged onto my PC just ten minutes ago. As usual I came straight onto ATS as I do most mornings to see the latest posts. As I looked through the threads I entered the Enigma-amginE thread. Then I checked the Enigma page and tried entering a few numbers in the text box at the bottom with no success.

BUT then, my browser froze up and I recieved an error message:

firefox.exe - System Error
The maximum number of secrets that may be stored in a single system has been exceeded. The length and number of secrets is limited to satisfy United States State Department export restrictions.

What the hell does this mean? I live in the UK btw.

Then, I rebooted my pc and now I must re-activate windows within 3 days.

What the hell is going on?

Actually - there is another reason this could happen - although there was a virus in 2009 which acted like this. Forefox can only hold so many passwords, this is a fact. Perhaps the game started loding thousands of passwords into Firefox using java or something?

Check yur password lists in firefox.

reply to post by Kryties


Don't think so.
msdn.microsoft.com... (search for "secrets")

Probably something to do with max number of encrypted files and/or passwords.
How you can fix this I have no idea.

reply to post by Shamatt


All my passwords are automatically deleted when I close the browser. All web history, form data etc.

reply to post by Kryties


Maybe but what about having to reactivate windows? Surely that isn't part of the game, you know what I mean?

reply to post by Taz2122


Ah yes, I searched secrets and came up with the same message, bar the US State Department stuff:

Error Message:
The maximum number of secrets that may be stored in a single system has been exceeded.

Explanation:
A secret is an encrypted piece of information, such as a password or user name.

User Action:
Contact the supplier of the running application.

Originally posted by Wide-Eyes
reply to post by Shamatt

 

All my passwords are automatically deleted when I close the browser. All web history, form data etc.

But if Firefox crashed it will not have run its shutdown routines and deleted them on exit as you set it to. It's only a hunch, but check your password files. It is possible something on the page yuo linked to did this. It may be part of the game. Show Passwords on the scurity tab might show up instructions for the next part of the game? Or I could be a raving loonie lol!

I'd cehck it out.

OK, so I have to apologise, I googled your problem and it seems to be one that a few people have had.

The suggestions I found include running your antivirus/spyware program and doing a clean-up of your PC using something like CCleaner. The problem appears to be a corrupted or full password file within Firefox that should be fixed by running this software...

Here's a few links to programs I use:

AVG Free Antivirus + Firewall
Spybot - Search and Destroy Anti Spyware Free
Peerblocker

And the CCleaner software (Registry and File cleaner...)
CCleaner

Originally posted by Kryties
OK, so I have to apologise, I googled your problem and it seems to be one that a few people have had.

The suggestions I found include running your antivirus/spyware program and doing a clean-up of your PC using something like CCleaner. The problem appears to be a corrupted or full password file within Firefox that should be fixed by running this software...

Here's a few links to programs I use:

AVG Free Antivirus + Firewall
Spybot - Search and Destroy Anti Spyware Free
Peerblocker

And the CCleaner software (Registry and File cleaner...)
CCleaner

edit on 21/9/2011 by Kryties because: (no reason given)

I seccond the reccomendations for Spibot and CCleaner to all readers. I use them, and Spibot always picks up stuff left by my av software.

reply to post by Kryties


Do you have to pay for the CCleaner Registry cleaner?