when typing in a search in the address bar i get redirected to a search assist by Teoma. How can i stop this
Normally when i type a subject into the address bar i get sent to a website that deals with that subject. For example if i typed in "Iron Man" in the address bar then i would be sent to a movie website with iron man details. Now when i type in a subject on the address bar i get redirected to a search assist website powered by Teoma. I haven't changed my default search and I've never even heard of Teoma so I really cant stand that i get redirected there. if i cant get rid of it then i am getting rid of firefox all together because that was the one feature that it had over internet explorer that really mattered to me. How do i change that
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This sounds like "virus/trojan" activity on your BHO (browser helper objects). Other than doing a virus scan and spyware scan, here's something you can look into (got plugins and addons that are Microsoft/Windows related in your addons list presenting a security leak?). In the address bar, type "about:config". A list of FF configurations should come up. There should be a filter area at the top of this. Type "search" and about 18 things should come up...here you might find the offender. I have attached a pic of mine. The installed straight up non messed with FF will actually have a special lead for the "feeling lucky" find that you describe whereas I have turned that off by applying what you see on mine.
nothing comes up when i perform a virus scan. i typed in the "about:config" and my setup looks exactly like yours. still cant find out the problem
I believe I've figured this out. You probably don't have a virus and there may not be much you can do. What is probably happening here is that the DNS provided by your ISP is trapping the request and redirecting you to the teoma server (run by ask.com).
When you enter "flurdl" into the address bar, first the browser (& network stack) tries to resolve it as a host name into an ip address, by contacting the DNS server. If it resolves to an ip address, the connection proceeds. If DNS replies there is no such host, the browser passes it onto your search provider to perform a search.
Your ISP has cut a deal with teoma such that when there is no host, instead of returning that, they return the teoma address. Your browser connects to that address and teoma returns its search page. So your browser never realizes it needs to search; it thinks it hit a valid page.
Why do they do this? Because the search engine gets paid for the "preferred" entries in the search result.
Your options are probably twofold: 1) don't search from the address bar, use the search bar instead. 2) Find another more honest DNS provider and configure it explicitly in your network settings.
A problem that Alawar Games dropped on my computer was the URL search hijacker "searchassist.teoma.com," which redirects your URL search to Ask.com. Don't bother changing keyword.url in about:config because it won't work. SuperAntiSpyware gets rid of it, in this case.