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Hi All,

I run Windows XP and everything appears to work fine, I can surf the web at will, all is fast and easy EXCEPT that I cannot access ANY Mozilla sites whatsoever unless through a proxy browser. I have tried so many different methods and still have not come up with a solution.

Normally Firefox would be my default browser but after installing and uninstalling it several times, I am forced to go back to IE7. Even IE7 will not access any Mozilla sites either, and I mean anything even remotely having the name mozilla or firefox in the address bar UNLESS I use a proxy site to access it. ALL OTHER sites are working as normal. Weird!

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Yours,

Firestumped

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Dani AI

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When a web proxy can reach mozilla/firefox sites but the machine itself cannot, that pattern points to local blocking rather than a general network outage. As suggested, an installed utility that blacklists vendor domains or edits the hosts file is a likely place to look — but test first to avoid guessing.

Quick, non-destructive checks: open a Command Prompt and run nslookup www.mozilla.org. If you get a normal public IP, DNS is working; if it resolves to 127.0.0.1, 0.0.0.0 or fails, check the hosts file at C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts (open Notepad as administrator) and remove any lines mentioning mozilla, firefox, or related hostnames. After editing run ipconfig /flushdns and retry. If DNS looks fine but browsers still fail, briefly disable third-party firewall/antivirus to test, and verify IE proxy settings (Internet Options -> Connections -> LAN Settings).

If those tests don’t help: run netsh winsock reset from an elevated prompt and reboot; try Safe Mode with Networking or create a new Windows user to see if the block is per-user; check any installed "immunize/hosts protection" features in cleanup/security tools and restore defaults or disable them for testing. When reinstalling Firefox, start with a fresh profile to rule out profile-level interference.

Caution: back up the hosts file before editing and only disable security software temporarily while testing. If the issue remains, capture the nslookup output and paste the small hosts-file contents (only lines mentioning mozilla/firefox); that information will clearly show if the block is coming from hosts/DNS or from a filtering tool.

Member Avatar for firestumped

some kind of software issue was blocking mozilla... I think one of either spywareblaster by javacool or ASC by Iobit

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