"Engine initialization failure" appears in Norton Toolbar on IE7

Norton Security | Norton Internet Security
1

I get this error ("Engine initialization failure") when visiting a variety of sites, most of which are probably heavy users of JavaScript, though sometimes even in a Google results page. I assume that the Norton Toolbar is emitting the message since that's where the message appears. Not surprisingly, pages showing this error experience a variety of problems, and I have to switch to a different browser. Has anyone else seen this?

 

My guess is that the toolbar plugin is spawning another JScript engine (probably with a stricter security profile) to parse scripts and look for vulnerabilities. Can someone from support comment, and suggests info I can gather to help in resolving the problem?

 

My environment is: Dell M90, 4G, Vista Business SP2, IE7 (7.0.6002.18005); the "default" JDK (in Program Files\java) is a 1.4.2_04 (the original JRE that came with Vista), but JAVA_HOME currently points to a 1.5.2_22 installation (full JDK).   

2

djhill8262

 

I'm not 'official' support but I do have a question. Why IE 7? IE9 is out and works well here and at other sites.

I don't think that I visit most of the pages you refer to since I have yet to see that error message. I will assume that they are necessary for you.

You also mention going to another browser, which one or do you have to cycle through several to get things done on these sites?

No real help but the added information will be useful

Thanks

 

3

I didn't like IE8. I plan to switch to IE9 after a few more maintenance cycles. However IE7 is still in wide use, and there's no guarantee the same problem wouldn't occur with IE8 or IE9.

 

In this case I switched to Chrome, for which there's no Norton plugin. I also use FF and Safari (no plugin) for testing. I can try FF, but I use that regularly for certain sites (mostly manga ;-) and have never seen the error there. I'll try that later - after the Lightning send the Bruins back to Boston for game 7.

 

4

I confirmed that the problem does not occur in FireFox, so it's only in IE7. If it recurs after I upgrade to IE9 I'll update this thread then.

5

djhill8262

 

Sounds like a plan

will wait for your update

Thanks

 

6

djhill8262,

 

I'm curious, can you point out some sites where you see this behaviour? I have IE7 and haven't seen this and hence the question. May be I haven't visited any sites that have intense JavaScript.

 

Kindly disable the links while posting as some may be malicious as well. We wouldn't want to trouble those mods :). 

 

-MbR

7

Here you go (this is definitely a safe site): http://www.hl7.org/implement/standards/index.cfm 

 

However note that memory usage and/or the number of tabs opened is involved. When this occurred I had 11 tabs open and IE7 was using 972MB. The tabs were:

1. TBO.com interactive weather radar (flash application)

2. cbssports.com (MLB scoreboard)

3. this page (Norton community)

4. theAnimalRescueSite (click to give)

5. theAnimalRescueSite (shelter challenge)

6. google results

7. twitter support article

8. google results

9. Sybase.com

10. google results

11. HL7.org standards page (only tab with the error)

 

When I closed all thye tabs except Norton Community and then went to HL7.org in a new tab, the error did not occur, IE7 still shows 934MB in use, so its probably the number of tabs - or what's going on in them - that causes the error. Since TBO.com, cbssports.com and theAnimalRescueSite all have alot of dynamic stuff, I went back and opened them one by one, testing the HL7 site after opening each one. Here's what I had open when I recreated the error:

 

1. TBO.com interactive weather radar (flash application)

2. cbssports.com (MLB scoreboard)

3. this page (Norton community)

4. theAnimalRescueSite (click to give)

5. theAnimalRescueSite (shelter challenge)

6. google results (search on "twitter sorry we did something wrong")

7. HL7.org standards page (only tab with the error)

 

Here's what's really interesting: when I closed the HL7 tab and then opened a new tab - in my case, new tabs always display the "unknown protocol" error page rather than about:blank -  the "engine initialization failure" error appeared immediately, before I even pasted in the HL7 url. This make me wonder whether IE7 reuses some of its control structures after you've closed a tab.

8

Hi I can confirm that this is occuring as well in IE7 / Windows XP  I just installed Norton 2011 and thats when it started previous version of norton was un-installed prior to installing the 2011 web protection. 

 

9

Thanks, mdsouza. That eliminates Vista as a factor.

 

A note on Flash, and the tbo.com interactive radar page I typically leave open all the time: there appears to be a memory leak, either in the tbo.com flash application, or in the flash player itself. What I've noted is that memory allocated to IE7 when this page is open climbs throughout the day. For example, IE7 with an empty about:blank home page initially consimes about 74MB. If I open the tbo.com radar page instead, it starts out at about 124MB, but climbs inexorably thereafter. I've seen this page alone result in 1.6BG memory allocation to IE7.

 

Since then, I've taken to hitting my Home button (which loads about:blank) if there's nothing going on in the radar, and later, I can just hit the Back button to re-check the weather. When I do this, I'll typically I'll see memory use drop dramnatically, but not all the way back to where you'd expect. And each time I repeat this process, more and memory remains allocated to IE7. Eventually I need to close it altogether and open a new instance.

 

I'm pretty sure that either memory loss or corruption is contributing to the situation that causes the error, but it appears the error itself is somewhere in the Norton toolbar code.

 

I guess at this point I should bite the bullet and install IE9, then try to recreate the error. I'll try t do that over the weekend.

 

10

This happens in IE8 with Windows 7 as well, it drives me CRAZY.  It's a flash or java-related issue, I believe.

11

Well, I've been using IE9 for about a week, and have been unable to recreate the problem despite opening as many as 20 tabs (all using heavy client-side scripting).

 

I still believe the failure is in the Norton Toolbar code, which is emitting the message. However I agree that memory mis-management in Flash is probably the root cause. IMHO, this is an uncorrected defect that Norton techs should identify, fix, and add to the regression bucket. This message is annoying but relatively innocuous; unfortunately, there's no way to be sure the underlying defect might not manifest (silently) in other ways that could pose a security risk.

 

So, Vista and Win7 users can upgrade to IE9 if the problem appears, but XP users are SOL.

12

Rats. I got the error this morning in IE9, too. The following tabs were open:

A new wrinkle: as I was editing this post, all the other tabs except this one closed without warning! I'd better submit this before this tab (or the IE9 instance) dies, too.

 

 

13

Correction: the other tabs didn't close.

 

Somehow, the tab I was editing the post in was either opened in a new browser instance, or it's tab became the only tab shown. I think I may have hit some keystroke combination that had the effect of "open this tab in a new window", but I can't find a context menu selection that would have that effect, so can't be sure. In any case after I submitted the post and closed the window, the original IE9 window was still there.

 

BTW, the page that shows the initialization failure error looks like a template page from some web hosting framework, and it looks like that site isn't really live yet (it has a home page, which has only one link, to a "contact" page). There's no application-oriented dynamic content at all - just the framework's skinning code and some google analytics stuff embedded at the bottom.

 

In any case, IE9 also gets the Engine Initialization Failure message, and as was the case in IE7, it shows up in the Norton toolbar.

14

Uninstall and reinstall the product. Either use add/remove programs or the Norton removal tool (www.norton.com/nrt) After the removal, check if the problem still exists. Please use the same websites that you go to so as to eliminate the risk of threats since you're basically unprotected. MIght easily be a problem with the BHO or browser helper object, the add-on for the Identity Protection provided by your Norton product but still, diagnose. The thing was, it took quite a bit of time for the patch to be released when IE9 came out. However, it was eventually done. A single run of liveupdate will fix this but sometimes, a complete uninstall/reinstall is needed if that won't work.

15

Ahh... another day with NRT.   ;-)

 

I'll try it this coming weekend.

 

BTW, in Firefox 4.0.1 (which also has Norton Toolbar), when I opened the same tabs in the same way (via search results, etc.) the error does NOT occur.

16

Sorry, I didn't have achance to do the reinstall yet. In the mean time I've had several recurrences.

 

FWIW, these errors do not appear to be associated with the creation of unkillable zombie IE processes.

17

Based on postings I see this is problem on all versions of IE and Windows OS, I noticed this issue in the last 48hrs and Live updates shows to be current. It is clearly annoying and really needs to be resolved. I am on Win7 and IE 8 

 

18

I got same message today for Windows  7, IE9 and my Norton crashed during full scan one day before and Norton automatically to re install and fixed the issue 

I am not sure that is my computer infected or Norton issue.

 

Your help and information is great appreciated,

 

 

Inung

19

Same issue here on Windows 7 with IE9.

 

There is a possibility that the problem started appearing after an Adobe updater instance - but I am not totally sure.

 

Before going the hassle of reinstalling NIS, does anyone have proof that it would solve the problem?

20
Tracian wrote:

Same issue here on Windows 7 with IE9.

 

There is a possibility that the problem started appearing after an Adobe updater instance - but I am not totally sure.

 

Before going the hassle of reinstalling NIS, does anyone have proof that it would solve the problem?

Hi,

I haven't kept score on which thing did what to cause the problem but the reinstall seems to solve most all of them. The easiest way is to use the Norton Remove and Reinstall Tool found here: http://us.norton.com/support/kb/web_view.jsp?wv_type=public_web&docurl=20110217171332EN

A word of warning . This will remove and NOT reinstall any other Norton products on yor computer. The reinstalled NIS will be the latest version on the Norton server.

Hope this helps