NASTY MALWARE!!! BEWARE!!!

[Tech_Greek]

Last week I formatted Vista back to XP. The next day I was getting my programs installed and hit a virus. I haven't had a virus in years and was about 90% done with my reinstall. I noticed that it infected roughly 50% of all the executables on my PC. Long story short I formatted and started over. Once XP was installed the first piece of software I installed was NOD32.

I consider myself a pretty safe surfer, hell I don't even have an AV solution on the PC I'm writing this from. I typically visit the same websites and seldomly fall off the beaten path. I don't know where I picked up the virus but they are a pain in the butt. My knee jerk reaction to friends/family members with PCs that are infected is to backup your pictures, music, movies, etc... and reinstall Windows. Why bother with HOURS of scans when it takes 30 minutes to reinstall Windows?

People like me have Photoshop Filters, Plug-Ins, Gigs of games installed, etc that are all a PITA to restore once you get it back up and running. And my scans take a total of two hours tops, one pass for combofix that takes 5 minutes on a BAD system, and 30 minutes for spy sweeper.

[Major_A]

Correct, but unfortunately I've never encountered only a handful of apps that actually clean all the files. Typically I can run 20 different programs and they can all find something. Reformat = no viruses. I agree with you on the reformatting part though, with my 750GB drive I am taking up easily over 150GB with applications on top of Windows. Reinstalling all those programs are a huge PITA. But thank goodness the average user, aka Grandma, only has Windows installed with maybe a handful of applications.

[stopthekilling77]

Thanks Tech_Greek, I'll give it a try this weekend when she drops her tower off at my place.

just be sure to verify that it found and killed the rootkit

[Tech_Greek]

Thanks Tech_Greek, I'll give it a try this weekend when she drops her tower off at my place.

just be sure to verify that it found and killed the rootkit

If you go into Spysweeper and click custom scan and set the options, it will scan restore sessions, root kits, and anything it THINKS might be a virus as well.

VERY thorough program.

If I run spy sweeper once, Spybot never comes back with anything.

[Mad_Goku]

Thanks for the info Tech_Greek.

Very good stuff. I didn't know of combofix and my in-laws computer has something pretty nasty. I'll try this out.

[martini161]

how did it get into the motehr board? try to flash his bios or something?

[Tech_Greek]

Boot Sector Virus

Reflash the mobo and you're golden, I've yet to see that in ten years though

[DaIceMan]

One word..
Avast

two words... doesn't matter. I use Avast and got this (though a different name) 2x. Once was from a legitimate website, the other time uncertain.

Malwarebytes Anti-Malware is the only cure for it, aside from reinstalling Windows.

Edit: after reading the entire thread, I see that I simply reiterated what everyone else said. haha.

[Sparky]

Well I gave up on my sisters PC that had Spyware 2009 (and who knows what else) and just reformated and did a clean install. Even after running Malwarebytes I still had problems connecting to the internet and with email. Backed up all their family pix etc. to another drive (scanned them using my PC) and she's good to go.

[Tech_Greek]

Well I gave up on my sisters PC that had Spyware 2009 (and who knows what else) and just reformated and did a clean install. Even after running Malwarebytes I still had problems connecting to the internet and with email. Backed up all their family pix etc. to another drive (scanned them using my PC) and she's good to go.

This is why I get paid what I do; the dial-a-fix problem should have solved 99% of those.

Either way, you've got more experience then most.