Akamai

[Les Harris]

I have a huge download problem and I don’t know where to go for help. With nothing open but my email and my home page, I get galloping downloads that can kill my monthly data limit very quickly. 500 MB in a day is very common, 1 GB happens too often and it can run to 2 GB a day.
This happened some years ago and I tracked it down to Akamai. After a lot of trial and error, I managed to stop it but I can’t find any way of choking it off this time. I have no idea why this has flared up again
I am running Win XP Pro. Netstat shows so many IP addresses (with nothing running but email and home page) that it would take all day to track them down and I still wouldn’t know which were the culprits. And no, this isn’t updates.

 

[beers]

I'd start scanning for malware. It probably doesn't help that you're using an operating system that no longer receives security updates.

 

[Les Harris]

Beers,
Indeed, it is an older OS and, but for the terminal paranoia of Mr Gates, it would still be a highly favoured OS, particularly by engineers such as myself. I do not take well to Microsoft's stand-over tactics and will continue to use it for several reasons, not the least of which is the stability and functionality of XP. Each new OS amounts to reinventing the wheel, which includes changing the location of everything and usually changing the name from one that was logically descriptive to one that is illogical and non-descriptive.
The last time this happened, I tracked it down to Akamai, which had gone all hysterical and kept blasting my computer with god knows what and notching up huge downloads on a box that usually ran to less than 100 MB per day of ordinary use.
Netstat provides a list of IP's but it is a long and tedious process to try to track them all down. Putting 'block Akamai' into Google brings up some very widely varying information, none of which seems to provide a starting point. Previous malware scans have yielded nothing.

 

[aldan]

the only reason to continue to run xp has nothing to do with bill gates paranoia but rather the users paranoia.in win7 ive had no trouble deleting akamai.as an old automechanic im much better versed in fixing just about anything other than a model a,if you know what i mean.as it stands,i dont usually respond to questions about xp anymore.

 

[johnb35]

Please run the following scans and post the logs.

1.

Please download AdwCleaner by Xplode onto your Desktop.



•Please close all open programs and internet browsers.
•Double click on adwcleaner.exe to run the tool.
•Click on Scan.
•After the scan you will need to click on clean for it to delete the adware.
•Your computer will be rebooted automatically. A text file will open after the restart.
•Please post the content of that logfile in your reply.
•You can find the logfile at C:\AdwCleaner[Sn].txt as well - n is the order number.

2.

Please download Junkware Removal Tool to your desktop.

•Shutdown your antivirus to avoid any conflicts.
•Very important that you run the tool in this manner:
Right-mouse click JRT.exe and select Run as administrator
Do NOT just double-click it.
•The tool will open and start scanning your system.
•Please be patient as this can take a while to complete.
•On completion, a log (JRT.txt) is saved to your desktop and will automatically open.
•Post the contents of JRT.txt in your next message.

3.

Please download Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware and save it to your desktop.

• Double-click mbam-setup.exe and follow the prompts to install the program.
• At the end, be sure a checkmark is placed next to
  • Update Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
  • and Launch Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
• then click Finish.
• If an update is found, it will download and install the latest version. Please keep updating until it says you have the latest version.
• Once the program has loaded, select Perform quick scan, then click Scan.
• When the scan is complete, click OK, then Show Results to view the results.
• Be sure that everything is checked, and click Remove Selected.
• A log will be saved automatically which you can access by clicking on the Logs tab within Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware

If for some reason Malwarebytes will not install or run please download and run Rkill.scr, Rkill.exe, or Rkill.com. If you are still having issues running rkill then try downloading these renamed versions of the same program.

EXPLORER.EXE
IEXPLORE.EXE
USERINIT.EXE
WINLOGON.EXE

But DO NOT reboot the system and then try installing or running Malwarebytes. If Rkill (which is a black box) appears and then disappears right away or you get a message saying rkill is infected, keep trying to run rkill until it over powers the infection and temporarily kills it. Once a log appears on the screen, you can try running malwarebytes or downloading other programs.

Please post the log that Malwarebytes displays on your screen.

4.

Download OTL to your Desktop


•Double click on the icon to run it. Make sure all other windows are closed and to let it run uninterrupted.
•Click on Minimal Output at the top
•Click the Quick Scan button. Do not change any settings unless otherwise told to do so. The scan wont take long.
◦When the scan completes, it will open two notepad windows. OTL.Txt and Extras.Txt. These are saved in the same location as OTL. Just post the OTL.txt file in your reply.

then post the logs from the following 4 programs.

1. Adwcleaner
2. Junkware removal tool
3. Malwarebytes
4. OTL