This morning my main Joomla site was hit with new windows popping up for BlueAdvertise, Credit Burner. It's a 1.0X site, but I read in another forum that a 1.5 site is having the same problem. I have a tendency to go overkill on things like this. I uninstalled of all my unused video plugins, and the Google section manager plugin. The problem went away, so I can't tell you which plugin contained the ad pop-ups. I also took the opportunity to get rid of the components I wasn't using. I haven't touched this site in months, so it was a "trusted" plugin that was hacked or modified. My site is also running much, much faster. But my CTR for the day is in the toilet. And, while I'm at it, the Jabode component is currently being targeted for SQL injections. I contacted the the guy who wrote it and he's thinking about issuing a new version.
The XtremVideoPlayPack plugin is responsible for the popups. I couldn't edit my original post or I would have just added it in. There is a thread on Joomla Forums about this. I knew one of the video players was link spamming, which is why they went first. It doesn't appear that the component was hacked at all. And they were getting $1.43 per click for their link banner. If a moderator can add this into to the original post so I'm not spamming, it'd be much appreciated.
ahhck, sorry to hear about your issues. There's nothing like a rogue advertiser. The sql stuff happens, they should and likely will fix it post haste. Nigel
Thank you. I appreciate that. Wasn't an advertiser. It was a plugin for video's, which I downloaded and installed. There is a great deal of trust for Joomla users and the people who make extensions for the CMS. The review system for Extensions generally ensures that any hidden advertising is exposed and it's considered a big NO in the Joomla community to spam links or have hidden advertising in the add-on components. Tell us - yes, and we'll install at our own risk, but to plan this and have it pop-up when you have a big enough user base is stupid. I can't find the plug-in listed in Joomla Extensions anymore, so the Joomla admins moved quickly to remove it from the directory. Also, a lot of people have gone back to advertiser, so chances are his account has been suspended. Considering the amount of links you can get from a good Joomla add-on, it was just a dumb thing to do. They'll lose a lot of back links in the next update and a useful plug-in guarantees a PR 5-7 site. There's a site that released one template and got a PR5. The French Joomla users solved this first and it filtered back to the English speakers forum. Big kudos to the French forum.