Why does the mouse pointer jump around the screen?

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My wired mouse is causing the same, as soon as I try to point and click it jumps all over and move to the side. It came on a week ago,it feels like a virus/trojan or something causing it

My wired optical mouse works perfect, but last week I found a Trajan and a worm. and it was resending it self to other people though Windows Live Messenger. I Found out the Virus Takes control of the Mouse pointer to make changes in the computer settings and steels information like names addresses and credit card info I Crashed my Logon setting and the Desktop display. it got in as an MP3 file.

"Make sure there's no high contrast text"
... that was the sentence that really helped!!!

Actually, to make sure the problem is not caused by the surface, I tried a newspaper. I thought, here there is enough "contrast borders" to follow the movements - and that was exactly the wrong way.

Now, after successfully trying with a white paper, I realised, that my white painted surface got more and more black dots over the years, and so the problem became more and more.

my mouse just started jumping around. It is not only my optical mouse, but my touch pad on my laptop and also another I plug into my computer, seems that whatever mouse I put does the same thing. Is it my computer? I tried to see if it was dirty, but all three of them act the same way. can you help me?

Hello, I have a HP laptop but my mouse jumps around on the screen when I hold my finger on the mouse pad. What can it be?

it's nothing wrong with my mouse i don't have one so don't give me that I don't have one (it's in the computer) the MOUSE POINTER in f. upp! it likes the left corner.. i have no control of it sometimes... i have antivirus but everytime i sertch ther's one virus that my computer can's delite...andif it is that one WHAT DOI DOO HELP?!!

Rob Davis said: "someone is remotely snooping on your screen..."

With all due respect, that's probably true for 1 in a zillion cases. But way-to-go for adding to the common user's Internet paranoia (sorry, I can't avoid sarcasm in cases like this).

For those truly concerned though, ignore Rob Davis' comment and know that, a cheap mouse (like every mouse that comes with new computers) will be prone to jumpy pointers. My rule of thumb...if it costs less than 15 - 20 dollars at Staples or Wal-mart (or if it came with your computer), it's going to be jumpy.

I took your suggestion and dumped my very shiny Elvis mouse pad; I am now using my wood grained desk top--voila! No more problems! This is a brand new computer, so after being unsuccessfull with the manufacturer I was fortunate to find your suggestion.

My mouse is jumping around on my Acer laptop with Vista. A few months ago, I had different mouse options on Control Panel but now I don't have those. (I had sensitivity, tapping, etc. but now I don't: where did they go?)

my case probably similar to Amelie, i don't have any external mouse attached to my tablepc, just the touchpad. and i am not even touching the pad.. i am just sitting here glaring at the screen, when the mouse start to jump around, it either like the bottom corner left or bottom corner right of the screen.. and not only jump, it also click (left click) on the spot..i have to move the task bar on the top of the screen so it won't click on the START button.

any clue? AV return no virus, the behavior is not persistent, sometime it just let go and sometimes it suddenly became very erratic.

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