How to get rid of viruses?

GT_Prologue5

GT_Prologue5

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GTP_GTPrologue5
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The name says it. Recently, my computer got virus stricken, with a huge warning running down my screen. My computer restarts every 25 minutes or so, and almost all files can't be opened due to these. (IE works though)

Of course I don't have money, so is there a way to get rid of them, or am I just screwed?
 
Install avast and run a full scan. Also install malwarebytes and scan with that. Avast also has a software firewall(works pretty well) and I have been using this on all of my computers. Best of all, free.

If that does not work then I'd suggest that you take the hard drive(mount the hard drive into another computer) out and have another computer do the scans.
 
Go into control panel and find internet options. In the window that appears about half way down look for the delete button. It will say delete cookies ecetera. It will also say delete temporary internet files. Delete everything. Restart. Next go to control panel again and go to add/remove programs. Look for anything dodgy or something you dont recognise. If its something that shouldnt be there try and uninstall it. If it wont budge.,and you can get onto IE, download AVG and try and get Revo uninstaller too.
 
There are 2 things you can do. Reinstall windows OS or roll your computer back to a restore point where you didn't have the virus. Both work. The os reinstall works best because you can reformat the HDD and that will kill everything. I would try the restore point method in safe mode first. I have used both methods with success. Google search it first so you know what your doing. Using the anti virus software to get rid of the virus takes forever when the computer is so unresponsive. Good luck.
 
Just avoid going on the internet on your PC? (I.e., use the PS3 interface, a smartphone or another computer)

That's what my younger brother does. He has a $4,000AU PC system but uses the outdated PC in the home-office when he needs to use the internet (it's quite annoying).
 
You should definitely download the already mentioned avast! and I would also recommend SUPERAntiSpyware and HiJackThis. They are all free and fantastic tools.

Run FULL scans, first with avast! and then with SUPERA.S., let both programms delete all suspicious files. After you've done that, make a system scan and save a logfile with HiJackThis, analyze the file here: http://www.hijackthis.de/en and "fix" all bad entries.

After all of that, restart your PC and do the same again, some files come back after rebooting.
 
Thanks for the suggestions, I'll pick one until it works.

And GT Pro, I don't own another computer, nor do I get to use the Internet on my phone (bills bills bills)

And my sister has it fixated so that I never use Internet on my PS3 again. I also don't like the PS3 browser anyways...

EDIT: Okay, IE doesn't let me download software. (Google Chrome did before it was corrupted) Now what should I do? I also couldn't access Internet Options in my Control Panel.
 
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Keep on pressing F8 when you boot up the computer. A text menu should come up, select "Safe Mode with Networking", and press enter. Now try to download the software and run them as soon as you installed them.
 
nick09
Keep on pressing F8 when you boot up the computer. A text menu should come up, select "Safe Mode with Networking", and press enter. Now try to download the software and run them as soon as you installed them.
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I was just about to say I did that! Except I used System Restore (which wasn't working w/ viruses) and now it works fine. Thanks everyone.
 
Alright just do a full scan to make sure of that the viruses are gone. Some of them like coming back. Oh yeah, if you don't have adblock plus, then I'd recommend that you install it.
 
Honestly, the best solution if there are apparent viruses is to format the OS partition and just reinstall. That is usually what I do anyhow.
 
Like has been said, once the computer has been infected your best bet is a fresh Windows install. Trying to clean the computer as is would be risky because there is no guarantee once you've got rid of the symptoms that the computer is clean. Modern virus are much more discrete than those of old as their goal is to quietly skim your account details and perhaps also make your system run as part of a botnet.

Such intrusive symptoms as those your computer has could possibly suggest more than one infection conflicting with each other so in all honesty your current install is a lost cause, you don't want to chance that even if you get it running again there is a root kit still active.

Once you have it running clean again the next step is to prevent it happening again. Windows 7 is the best Windows to run as it has a far lower infection rate. Setting up a password protected admin account and then running as a normal user is the best practice. Microsoft Security Essentials is also quite a good, none intrusive anti virus software and it's free. Then browser wise I'd suggest Firefox with the noscript addon. This is a whitelist protection which is the most powerful and effective kind, it's slightly intrusive as you have to enable scripts to run on a website by website basis which is a simple case of when you go on a site, if you know it's safe you tell noscript to allow scripts and then it's forever added to your whitelist.

The next step is for when you are going on websites which potentially are hazardous is to run them in a virtual machine. You can use MS Windows Virtual PC if you have Windows 7 Pro or higher or VirtualBox and Ubuntu if not.

The benfits of that are when you are on sites of a slightly questionable nature any potential threat is contained to the virtual pc keeping the normal OS install clean.
 
Since this thread can be about more then one Virus I thought i'd put my question up..

I currently have a Mac, but I have a handy program installed called Parallels. It's literally a Microsoft PC inside my Mac on one program. I was browsing the internet and found a good-looking program which was a game-shark, so I downloaded it and transfered it to my 'Virtual PC' and follow it's instructions only to have my computer tell me it has run out of RAM. It then because incredibly slow and I was unable to delete the files. I then tried to find the system restore button on the Control Panel and I couldn't find it. I then decided to give up and restart the computer, big mistake, now when I turn the Virtual PC on nothing comes up but my desktop picture. It may be because of it being slow, but, how do I remove the virus if I can't access anything? Oh! And a previous virus disabled internet access on the Virtual PC.

BY the way, it runs like a regular PC, it has Windows XP Home Ed. On it and a small 512MB of RAM, which I can increase to about 1GB. I would really like to not have to restore or re-install anything since I have Data that I probably cannot re-create.
 
'Round the bend
Since this thread can be about more then one Virus I thought i'd put my question up..

I currently have a Mac, but I have a handy program installed called Parallels. It's literally a Microsoft PC inside my Mac on one program. I was browsing the internet and found a good-looking program which was a game-shark, so I downloaded it and transfered it to my 'Virtual PC' and follow it's instructions only to have my computer tell me it has run out of RAM. It then because incredibly slow and I was unable to delete the files. I then tried to find the system restore button on the Control Panel and I couldn't find it. I then decided to give up and restart the computer, big mistake, now when I turn the Virtual PC on nothing comes up but my desktop picture. It may be because of it being slow, but, how do I remove the virus if I can't access anything? Oh! And a previous virus disabled internet access on the Virtual PC.

BY the way, it runs like a regular PC, it has Windows XP Home Ed. On it and a small 512MB of RAM, which I can increase to about 1GB. I would really like to not have to restore or re-install anything since I have Data that I probably cannot re-create.
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Boot it in safe mode (normally done by pressing F8 during boot up but I'm not sure about on a Virtual PC, I'm sure a quick google will explain how to do it) then install & run Malwarebyte (run in safe mode as well as installing in safemode if it requires a restart). At the very least if it will run in sade mode you can retrieve the data you want to save for a fresh install.
 
Thanks for the help, but Mac Keyboards 'F' Buttons are different. Example is, F7 is Previous Track, F8 is Pause, F9 Is Next, F10 is Mute, F11 is turn down and F12 is turn up.

I also cant access the internet on the actual PC. Only on the Mac. :\
 
'Round the bend
Thanks for the help, but Mac Keyboards 'F' Buttons are different. Example is, F7 is Previous Track, F8 is Pause, F9 Is Next, F10 is Mute, F11 is turn down and F12 is turn up.

I also cant access the internet on the actual PC. Only on the Mac. :\
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Doesn't google work on a mac? :)
 
His description sounds like one of the many fake AVs that are out there, throwing ominous warnings up on his screen, and telling him any file he tries to run is infected. He's probably being told to send them 50 bucks for the "full" version which can repair all this stuff.

He probably doesn't have anywhere near the infection rate this stuff is telling him he has. He just has the one piece of fake AV-scanner malware, or even multiple variants of it.

The malware is a fraud, throwing fake warnings up, and when they get your 50 bucks they email you a code that turns it off. Temporarily. Until "renewal" time.

They're also usually smart enough to block access to legitimate AV and malware sites, or even redirect them to fake sites. They are also usually rootkits which most scanners running on the booted Windows won't have access to.

The best way to get rid of these is a bootable-CD-based scanning tool, so the system comes up without reading anything from the hard disk. Kaspersky makes a great on called Rescue Disc, sownloadable as an ISO that you burn, then boot from.
 
I'm currently using Micro Soft Security Essential....
As I know about it, it a powerful software against malware/ spyware...
It works pretty fine...
 
While it works good so far, I wouldn't trust in a Microsoft product.
I can only recommend avast! again, coupled with either Malwarebytes or SUPERAntiSpyware. All of them are available for free (or in a "Pro" version for a couple of bucks), SUPERAntiSpyware doesn't update automatically in it's free version but pressing the two buttons to update isn't too difficult.

And something I also have to mention again is HiJackThis.
It scans your registry and running processes, so you will see if there's some suspicious software running in the background. I scan my computer almost every day with it.

By the way, I am in the internet since 2005 and I never had a single virus on my system(s) and I use my PC the whole day, every day.
 
I'm sorry but if you've never had a virus on the internet that means one of three things. You run a Unix type OS (linux/BSD etc..), you have and just don't know because most virus/trojan/spyware/malware these days is designed to run under the radar skimming data.

Or frankly you're just not using the internet properly as a man:)
 
If you mean pornsites with your last sentence, indeed, I am careful.
I was running Windows all the time, the first couple of weeks 95, the other years XP.
I always used a proper anti virus software, don't download stuff from torrent websites, use Firefox including AdBlock, don't open suspicious E-Mails and only browse well-known websites. I'm also following news regarding safety issues, the last time Java was hacked massively I deactivated the affected plug-in until the needed update was out. There's definitely nothing running in the background either.

I had a virus warning on another PC once I used while my old one was broken, was browsing a blog with MSFSX screenshots, scanned that thing with HiJackThis, fixed two bad entries, scanned again after a reboot and it was clean.

Be careful, use a router with a good firewall, update your software and you won't get any virus, at least not that fast.
 

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