Programs randomly lose/gain focus

Hello! Long time reader, first time poster here.

I'm normally experienced enough to take care of issues myself, however this problem has left me running in circles. Since this morning's bootup, I've seen my windows randomly lose focus- For example, Firefox here has been deselected once and I have to turn the focus back here to be able to actually post. It does this with all software I've run, including Steam, MSN, etc, etc.
When I'm running a fullscreen application, the program is minimized to the task bar, similar to how it does when you press alt+tab to minimize it, only I didn't press alt+tab. The game doesn't freeze, I can just click it in the task bar and I can continue playing, but this is getting increasingly annoying.

I've done alot of searching around on my own and have seen people solve this problem in various ways but none of the solutions I've seen so far helped me. I've been through countless guides to clean my computer up of malware and spent several hours waiting for scans to complete, and as far as I can tell, my computer is as clean as I can get it to be.

As far as I'm aware, there was no software change and there was definately no hardware change.
The most recent thing I would suspect would be doing a windows update about three, maybe four days ago?

I'm aware this can be caused by many, many things but eh.. Worth asking anyways.

[Moderator]

See if TweakUI helps - once you install it click on GENERAL - then FOCUS

Nope. The setting was enabled, so just in case I disabled it and applied settings, the reenabled it and applied again. I just spent a good 20 minutes playing Left 4 Dead and waiting to see if it would still minimize, which it did when I was starting to think it had worked. Does this mean XP is not the culprit?

[Moderator]

Don't know for sure. Just to completely rule out malware, why not post a hijack this log in the malware forum?

Maybe there is hope yet. I googled once more, using different words to get different hits. This time I found one who had a similar issue on Microsoft's support site. Someone had replied with, amongst the few solutions, a tool that logs the foreground window. So I started the tool and went to play the Left 4 Dead 2 demo yet again. After about 20 minutes, BAM. Tool has logged what looks to be some kind of virus. So I'ma go ahead and post a HijackThis log soon.

I took a screenshot of the logger and what it said to clarify, just because I feel kinda victorious. Finally, after 10 hours of trying to figure out what it is, I finally have a clue. |D

Above the selected line you can see how Left 4 Dead 2's demo takes the focus, and I play it for a bit. Then, according to the tool, something launches a 'Web Browser' with the 'visible' property at 'no'. Directly under the selected line is another very peculiar line. Then I put the L4D2 window back in focus, quit it and go to work at posting here.

The thing is, if it is malware, then it must be either very hard to detect or relatively new. I spent 3-4 hours today with antimalware guides. Everything from updating what I have and scanning and downloading other programs one at a time and letting them scan one at a time. Everything I tried had no results.

Either way, this looks like malware, so I'ma mosey on down and get a HijackThis log and stuff.


[Saving space, attachment deleted by admin]

for elimination I usually do virus and malware scan everytime I feel something is not right to my rig.
vast, malwarebytes and ccleaner is my combination.

until now it never failed me, specially avast.

or you may update and scan your system with your antivirus.
good luck I hope it helps.

Maybe there is hope yet. I googled once more, using different words to get different hits. This time I found one who had a similar issue on Microsoft's support site. Someone had replied with, amongst the few solutions, a tool that logs the foreground window. So I started the tool and went to play the Left 4 Dead 2 demo yet again. After about 20 minutes, BAM. Tool has logged what looks to be some kind of virus. So I'ma go ahead and post a HijackThis log soon.

I took a screenshot of the logger and what it said to clarify, just because I feel kinda victorious. Finally, after 10 hours of trying to figure out what it is, I finally have a clue. |D

Above the selected line you can see how Left 4 Dead 2's demo takes the focus, and I play it for a bit. Then, according to the tool, something launches a 'Web Browser' with the 'visible' property at 'no'. Directly under the selected line is another very peculiar line. Then I put the L4D2 window back in focus, quit it and go to work at posting here.

The thing is, if it is malware, then it must be either very hard to detect or relatively new. I spent 3-4 hours today with antimalware guides. Everything from updating what I have and scanning and downloading other programs one at a time and letting them scan one at a time. Everything I tried had no results.

Either way, this looks like malware, so I'ma mosey on down and get a HijackThis log and stuff.

Hi,

I have exactly the same problem. Any luck finding a solution?

I think I found a solution. Haven't restarted yet, but thought I'd just post it before I forgot.

http://forums.avg.com/cz-en/avg-free-forum?sec=thread&act=show&id=41015#post_41015

Hi, I solved it on XP:

I had the same problem and some more:
- Programs losing focus because of malware
- Many anti-virus programs being blocked (looks like they've been uninstalled)
- I was unable to successfully install software onto my PC like other virus scanners.

I scoured the internet looking for solutions. I spent tedious hours, searching and trying different approaches. I found the Internet Explorer window which opens invisibly every 10 or so seconds, but after that it was back to searching for solutions. I came across a set of programs I was able to install and run on my pc. These come from Trend Micro. The program I used was RootkitBuster. The link is here: http://free.antivirus.com/rootkit-buster/.

Install and run it on your PC, then take the following steps:
- Click the scan now button
- Click delete selected items.
- Let your system restart.
- Once you're back on windows wait for your virus scanner to open or open it yourself
- Run a scan.

In my case everything was back to normal apart from my internet connection. After restarting the PC and having windows install updates everything was sorted.

This was my encounter, not sure if it works for everyone but it might be worth the try. good luck ^^