[Edwood]

Man, as careful as I am, looks like this install of Windows is toast.

I've run Ad-Aware countless times. But everytime I launch IE, I get a whole bunch of pop ups, and every time I reboot, I get a whole bunch of them coming back, despite how many times Ad-Aware cleans them out.

Looks like Spyware wins. Ad-Aware has been defeated.

This is the first time I've had Ad-Aware been totally defeated.

I don't know what else to do other than reinstall Windows.

-Ed

 

[Imyourzero]

That stinks. It ticks me off that some people are forced to do a reinstall of Windows over advertisements that are not only annoying, but intrusive as well.

Have you tried installing the MS AntiSpyware beta? It found some stuff on my system that Ad-Aware, Spybot, and the other regulars missed.

Also, you might try this before wiping your system clean...might as well try the free scan, can't hurt!

 

[MisterX]

Try Trend's free spyware tool
http://www.trendmicro.com/spyware-scan/

I found it works a little better then Ad-aware does.

 

[Born2bwire]

One of the more interesting and annoying spywares that I opened on purpose (was bored that day) actually ran a program on startup. You could legitimately uninstall all the software and have Ad-Aware clean the registry, but on startup this program would check and reinstall all the spyware. I finally figured out what program was being run and got rid of it and everything was honkey-dorey after that. It didn't take me long to find out about it because it always would crash so I would get the prompt from Windows about that. Which unfortunately means I cannot tell you off-hand how you would go about finding something like this but I would keep an eye out for any new processes that are being run.

 

[lan]

Crazy. What kind of sites have you been going to?

Your web browser has been 'jacked. Probably something in your registry has been modified and there's some sort of program that keeps reloading and modding the registry again. I've had something similar happen to me. I had to manually edit things. Stop the offending processes first. Delete those fake files. Clean using anti-spyware program. It help if you know what you're up against though.

What's up with using IE? You could just stop using it.

 

[ayt999]

how about using HiJackThis?

 

[Edwood]

I use Kaspersky, and it caught 3 trojan viruii.

Did the whole system scan again, and there are still pop ups. Argh!

Going to use Firefox (as much as I hate it) in the meantime till I have time to reinstall Windows.

-Ed

 

[Edwood]

What? I'm seeing a bunch of words in green with an underline in which they are sponsored links?

Is this new, or is it part of the spyware and trojans?

-Ed

 

[kramer5150]

You know sometihng.... i have several friends complain about spyware problems. 5-6 of them were complete takeovers. These are PCs with various releases of windows, various anti-virus programs as well as spyware filter software.

the ONE constant factor?.... those PCs that were rendered useless were using MS IE as the primary www browser.

I know from my own experience, running that thing is like an open door for ALL KINDS of MS activity behind your back. I think I've used IE collectively for ~20 some-odd hours total in my life, and Ive always had the worst spyware problems with that browser, during those 20 or so hours.

Been on netscape most of the time. Most recently Mozilla firefox, and it blows IE away completely, from a security standpoint.

MS IE is faster... but I dont think thats because its www surfing faster... rather it pulls from Cache quicker than Mozilla. (Dont quote me on that.... thats just my hunch).

that sucks Ed... Hope you can recover that PC or at least retrieve whatever files are of value.

Garrett

 

[kramer5150]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood What? I'm seeing a bunch of words in green with an underline in which they are sponsored links? Is this new, or is it part of the spyware and trojans? -Ed

I dont see anything but black unlinked text.?

What dont you like about firefox?... just curious.

Garrett

 

[MisterX]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood What? I'm seeing a bunch of words in green with an underline in which they are sponsored links? Is this new, or is it part of the spyware and trojans? -Ed

I thought that was all disabled now?
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=127710

Run msconfig and take a look at what is loading when your system starts....

 

[Edwood]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kramer5150 I dont see anything but black unlinked text.? What dont you like about firefox?... just curious. Garrett

Yeah, I don't see them anymore in Firefox. Why don't I like Mozilla et al?

I'm just lazy. I hate installing the hundreds of plug ins needed for it to just function with basic features built into IE.

Specific example? I tried that Zone Alarm Spyware scan, but guess what?

Quote:

You're using Netscape(Mozilla)! Sorry. This is an ActiveX control, it will only run in MS Internet Explorer!

Yeah, one of the many reasons I don't like Mozilla. It's not 100% compatible. I like tabbed browsing, but not enough to keep using it.

But right now I have no choice.

Oh, well, time to wipe this install. Is all my data fcked too?

I have a lot of music (APE) files on another drive in this system.

-Ed

 

[Edwood]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MisterX Try Trend's free spyware tool http://www.trendmicro.com/spyware-scan/ I found it works a little better then Ad-aware does.

Tried the TrendMicro one.

It found Bookedspaces and VX2 argh!

Rebooting again to see if it worked. If not I'm going to have to do a clean install. Fun fun fun.

-Ed

 

[Wodgy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood Yeah, I don't see them anymore in Firefox. Why don't I like Mozilla et al? I'm just lazy. I hate installing the hundreds of plug ins needed for it to just function with basic features built into IE.

Laziness works both ways. You're a very sophisticated computer user, and yet you got spyware by using IE. IE just takes more skill to stay safe than even a very above-average user like yourself has. As long as you keep using IE, in all likelihood you'll have to go through all of this again sometime in the future. Sounds like IE is the browser that requires more effort, both in terms of prevention and in terms of recovery.

Also, the "hundreds of plugins" thing sounds like your laziness talking. I can't think of a single feature that IE has except MHTML support that isn't in the default Firefox install. The converse, however, is not true. There are plenty of Firefox features that have no equivalent in the default IE install.

 

[gpalmer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edwood Yeah, one of the many reasons I don't like Mozilla. It's not 100% compatible. I like tabbed browsing, but not enough to keep using it.

That's backwards Edwood, It's Internet Exploder that is not compatible. They added a proprietary extension that will only function under Windows to lock customers in. Other browsers didn't because, surprise, surprise it's a security nightmare...