Question from Annika T.: During the last virus scan Norton found a couple of viruses and removed them. Now Internet Explorer won’t load any websites. All I get is a blank screen and a message saying the site might be down or something.
I know it’s not my Internet connection because Firefox still loads pages just fine. I really need to get IE back working again because I use it and Firefox together to use two Gmail accounts at the same time. Can you help me?
If it matters, my computer is running Windows 7 and Internet Explorer 11.
Rick’s answer: Annika, some malware will change IE to use a proxy server so they can redirect the browser’s page requests to scam websites. Removing the malware breaks the connection to the proxy server, leaving IE clueless as to how to find legitimate websites from that point forward.
Use the procedure below to deactivate the “Use Proxy Server” setting in Internet Explorer. Then close IE and re-open it and see if everything is back to normal. If not, let me know and I’ll tell you what to try next.
Steps for disabling the “Use Proxy Server” setting in Internet Explorer:
1 – Launch IE and select Tools>Internet Options.
2 – Select the Connections tab.
3 – Click the LAN Settings button.
4 – Uncheck the box beside Use a proxy server for your LAN.
5 – Click OK, then click OK again.
6 – Close all open Internet Explorer windows, then re-launch IE.
7 – Check to see if you can now visit your favorite websites as normal.
Give that a try Annika, and let me know whether it fixes your problem or not. Good luck!
Update from Annika: That took care of it Rick! Thank you!!!!
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