My XP Pro machine come up with sudden pop-ups as security alart. Also 3 desktop shortcut - 'error cleaner', 'privacy protector', 'spyware & malware protection' - installed automatically. IE home page automatically directed to 'safewebnavigate.com/index.php?sid=502&a... Windows security alert popup as "windows has detected an Internet attack attemp ... somebody's trying to infact your PC with spyware or harmful viruses. Run full system scan now ... click here to download spyware remover for total protection". Another popup - Trojan.W32.Looksky detected - continuously annoying me. System hanged. Tried many Antivirus, spyware, malware, trojan remover, even in safe mode but in vain. How can get rid of this. Any help please. Your PC has a smitfraud infection.
Try using the smitfraud fix. This should take care of it.
http://siri.geekstogo.com/SmitfraudFix.p... You have one or the other possibly both.
Used with permission from NumberSix6
Printing this would be helpful
You need not follow this in exact order, or even do all the steps, but it was written this way to ensure all issues where handled.
If you find one portion particularly helpful for removing a problem please email me
Step 1) DON'T PANIC! Take a deep breath and go grab a cup of your favorite beverage. This may take awhile.
Step 2) Clean up your pc. Remove programs you don't use via the Add/Remove Programs in the Control Panel. In Vista, you remove programs by clicking Programs and Features in the Control Panel. If you are unsure of a particular program, you can check it against a list of offenders here:
http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread....
Clean your hard drive of unnecessary files using CCleaner here: http://www.ccleaner.com/download/...
Save to your desktop, install it, then run the cleaner. Simple, yet it will free up tons of space on your hard drive. While you have the program open, run the Registry Checker as well. This will fix invalid registry entries safely. Note that you should run CCleaner for ALL accounts on your pc.
Step 3) Create a new System Restore point. Click Start>All Programs> Accessories>System Tools>System Restore. Create a restore point. Now delete all but this most recent restore point. Click Start>All Programs>Accessories> System Tools>Disk Cleanup. Click More Options tab, and then under System Restore, click Clean up. Click Yes to remove all but the most recent restore point. Click OK, click Yes, and then click OK.
Step 4) Now let's start to get rid of those nasties. Download the following programs to your Desktop. You should then install each one, but don't run them yet. Patience...patience.
Lavasoft's Ad-Aware from here: http://www.lavasoftusa.com/products/ad_a...
AVG Anti-Spyware from here:
http://www.ewido.net/en/download/...
Spybot Search and Destroy from here:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/downl...
SUPERAntiSpyware from here:
http://www.superantispyware.com/...
I know this seems like overkill, but until someone can come up with one program that can detect everything in the wild, we need to use programs from several reputable sources.
Step 5) Use them safely. Once these programs are installed on your pc, their effectiveness may be negated by running scans normally. You need to reboot your pc into Safe Mode. Shut down your pc, wait a few seconds, then turn it back on. As your computer restarts but before Windows launches, press F8.
Use the arrow keys to highlight the Safe Mode with Networking option, which loads all of the above files and drivers and the essential services and drivers to start networking, and press Enter. If Windows launches before you can choose a safe mode, restart your computer and try again. Now it's time to start each program you installed and run scans. First, open Ad-Aware, update to the latest signatures, and run a full system scan. Delete any malware found, close the program and move on to AVG Anti-Spyware. Again, update, run complete scan, and delete the baddies. Do the same for Spybot and SuperAntiSpyware. When you are finished, restart the computer normally.
Step 6) Clean up and protect. I would recommend leaving AVG and Ad-Aware on your system, and delete the other two. These anti-spyware programs do not conflict and offer good future protection. If you happen to like the interface of the others, then by all means keep the ones you want, just so long as you have at least one solid stand-alone on your system. Uninstall the others via Add/Remove in the Control Panel.
Step 7) Not done yet. We've taken care of the spyware, but there still may be viruses and trojans lurking on your pc. If there is an anti-virus program running on your pc, shut it down. Yes, you read right, end the program. We need to run a few online scans that may conflict with the anti-virus installed. Go to Trend Micro: http://housecall.trendmicro.com/... to download and run their free online scanner. Take whatever action the scanner tells you for any virus found. Finally, do the same with the Panda Online ActiveScan : http://www.pandasoftware.com/products/ac...
Restart your computer.
Step 8) Peace at last. Make sure your anti-virus program of choice is running again and is up-to-date. If you do not have one, I suggest AVG Free Antivirus here: http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/ or Avast 4 Home:
http://www.avast.com/eng/download-avast-...
Be sure you have at least one of the anti-spyware programs running, and also make sure you have a good firewall. PC Tools Firewall Plus is free and works on XP and Vista: http://www.pctools.com/firewall/... , as does WinPatrol 2007:
http://www.winpatrol.com/download.html.....
This procedure will remove MOST malware. However, it may not catch some really nasty buggers. If you've followed all the steps and still believe you have something not right on your pc, you need some extra help. Go here: http://www.tomcoyote.org/hijackthis... to download a program called HijackThis. It examines certain key areas of the Registry and Hard Drive and lists their contents. Install, run and save a logfile which you may post on one of the forums listed on that same page as above. Some kind soul will then come along and examine your logfile and give you recommendations in order to wipe any remaining buggers away.
Please email me with comments, suggestions, and errors. If you like it, feel free to pass it on to other infected folks.
You may also find this Tweaking Guide useful
http://www.tweakguides.com/TGTC.html
If you鈥檙e a Gamer he also has excellent guides to many games
Source(s):
Many years of cleaning infected pc's Assuming you have some reasonably updated antivirus and spyware protection program(s) at your disposal, try this:
Turn off system restore (right-click My Computer, choose Properties, then System Restore tab) and restart in safe mode (F8 while restarting; if you will need to update your anti-virus and spyware because the infections have not let you do that, make it safe mode with networking).
Run full-system scans, spyware and antivirus.
Restart. Now do an on-line free scan (like Housecall; google it, at trend micro).
If your computer is now clean, turn system restore back on (same steps as to turn it off) and create a new system restore point (click Start, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System Restore and create a new restore point).
Clean the registry (I use CCleaner, a free tool; google it, and "issues" is the registry cleaner there).
If you still have remnants or leftovers, try some other antivirus and/or spyware (like SuperAntispyware).
Good luck. One of the first things to do when you suspect malware is DISABLE System Restore.
If enabled, this allows malware to hide in the computer and re-install itself.
So, to disable it, RIGHT-click on "My Computer." Select "Properties" then under the 'System Restore' tab, check 'Turn off system restore' IF not already checked.
The next most helpful things that would help you are to use ONLINE scanners from websites to remove any malware on your PC.
The current best online scanners I prefer are from Kaspersky antivirus and Bitdefender antivirus. Together, these 2 scanners will find ALL the bad stuff on your PC because they have the BEST detection rate.
First, use Kaspersky's. (FYI: ALL these scans require you to agree to a EULA and install an activex control which is needed to perform the scan, so agree to them all.)
*NOTE: Some scanners ONLY work with IE or may not fully remove malware
http://www.kaspersky.com/virusscanner (KAV)
Then scan with:
http://www.bitdefender.com/scan8/ie.html
There are MANY other good online scanners which you may choose to also use (which will take longer but ensure safety):
http://onecare.live.com/site/en-us/defau... (Windows Live Onecare)
http://www.emsisoft.com/en/software/ax/ (A-squared scanner)
http://www.ewido.net/en/onlinescan/ (ewido)
http://www.ca.com/us/securityadvisor/pes... (Spyware scan)
http://www.ca.com/us/securityadvisor/vir... (Virus scan)
http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/s... (Panda Antivirus)
http://www.housecall.trendmicro.com/ (TrendMicro)
http://www.eset.com/onlinescan/ (Nod32)
http://support.f-secure.com/enu/home/ols... (F-secure)
After using these, it's ESSENTIAL to install at least 3 antispywares. Do NOT use more than 1 antiVIRUS as they conflict.
The best things in life are FREE, and great free software can be found @:
Superantispyware.com (Superantispyware FREE version)
lavasoft.com (Ad-aware)
emsisoft.com (A-squared FREE)
safer-networking.org (Spybot S&D)
javacoolsoftware.com (SpywareBlaster, EULAlyzer, & MRU-Blaster)
microsoft.com (Windows Defender)
grisoft.com (AVG AV)
Avast.com (Avast AV)
avira.com (Avira AV)
activevirusshield.com (AOL Virus Shield, which is basically Kaspersky for free)
siteadvisor.com (Tells you how safe websites are)
phoenixlabs.org (Peerguardian blocks malware, government, and anti-p2p org's)
zonealarm.com (Top Notch Firewall)
comodo.com (Another Top Notch firewall)
iobit.com (Advanced Windows Care)
Eusing.com (Registry cleaner)
ccleaner.com (Junk file cleaner)
Now if you can afford it, the best software to BUY are:
Spy Sweeper
Security Task Manager
Norton Internet Security (Uses CPU but it's nice if you can afford to use those resources up)
Kaspersky (BEST! =D )
Bitdefender
F-secure (Same as Kaspersky)
Linkscanner (Blocks exploits in real time)
Advanced Uninstaller
If there's ever ONE file you suspect is infected, you can go to a couple of sites that have single file scanners which use MULTIPLE engines to scan a file.
They are virusscan.jotti.org and virustotal.com
If you're PC is squeaky clean, re-enable system restore because it IS good to have but we needed to shut it off to wipe out the malware.
Just RIGHT-click on "My Computer." Select "Properties" then under the 'System Restore' tab, UN-check "Turn off system restore."
*Another thing to consider is using another browser besides Internet Explorer. IE has a lot of security holes,
making it less safe than other browsers. I prefer Firefox from mozilla.org.
It's just as easy to use and has a lot of neat little add-ons you can toy around with. By itself, it is also safer from exploits than IE.*
As always, things will vary for you. I hope the best for everybody. As always, others may disagree but there's only one way to find things out---try it! As long
as you have an UPDATED Antivirus, Antispyware, & firewall, things will go smoothly. And browse wisely. As a side note, please email me any/all websites you got the infection from or if any are popping up or hijacking your page so I can help further security software's measures.
Sometimes you may get a NEW and Unknown malware and I can submit it to be blacklisted to companies.
Thx. Hope I was able to help and fix anything needed. If I have, please consider returning & leaving a nice comment and
"Best Answer" to whomever you thinks deserves it... You are infected with spywares.
Try GarbageClean antispyware from http://www.SecureMyWindows.com |
