I have had several instances of going to my own pages and even a couple of times on other sites and seeing the wrong ad in the space where the correct one should be.

Usually if I refresh or reload the page then the correct ad will come back. This even happened on my bank's site tonight.

Does anyone know why this happens and what, if anything, can be done to prevent it?

Thanks.

What exactly do you mean?

Is it banner ads you are referring to?

Sometimes ad networks such as Fastclick will run banners for Doubleclick when they have excess inventory.

Hi Chief,

It's not really banner ads, on my pages it is affiliate ads, which are in different sizes. They are not rotating banner ads. On my bank's site, the bank ad had a yahoo ad over it. It was a small one about 100 X 90 or smaller.

For example, I went to my bank's main web page, and in one corner there was a yahoo ad, which did not look normal, it looked pixelated and blurred and like it was stretched. When I reloaded that page, the usual bank ad reappeared.

On my own web pages, it happened several different times, where one of my affiliate ads was changed to some other ad, which also did not look normal, it looked blurred, pixelated and like it was stretched weird. One time the invading ad stayed for a while even though I refreshed the page. I checked the page in my local site, deleted it from the remote site and re-uploaded it.

I also saw the same thing on a friend's site once, where the ad for dotster (an affiliate ad) was showing something else, I can't remember what it was now. When I refreshed the page the dotster ad returned.

It seemed very strange to me. I know about browser hijacking, but not ad hijacking!

Do you have Gator installed? Do you sometimes get 'GAIN' popups. Gator can come with many other programs and is generally known as Spyware. It sometimes overwrites adverts on sites with its own, so this is what could be happening.

Try downloading AdAware and see if that finds anything.

No, I don't have gator installed. I have AdAware and I run it every day or two. I also have Zone Alarm Pro running all the time. I actually got a screen shot of an invading ad on my friends website a few days ago.

I sure would like to know how and why this happens.

Thanks.