Haunted Fubared Computer

I

IWKUA

Weaksauce
Joined
Jul 31, 2004
Messages
96
Alright my friend has one of the most messed up computers I have ever seen. It is a few years old emachines running xp home (windows updates applied), avg virus scan at one point and norton antivirus at another, ad aware, spybot search and destory, and the sbc protection software. She is behind a 2wire router with hardware firewall. Also firefox is installed and is the browser she uses. The computer is plagued by spyware and popups which I have no clue how they find their way onto her system. She only surf's the web in firefox, listens to music in itunes, and chats on aim. I have looked at her downloads and installed programs and she doesnt randomly download stuff off websites. However, stuff continues to pop up, even after several clean installs, and when she runs spybot it finds lots of things but says it is unable to fix them. She just did another clean install with the restore cd 2 days ago, imediately downloaded avg antivirus, the sbc antivirus and spyware protection software, firefox, aim, itunes, and windows updates and that is all. However today she started experincing slow downs again, so I had her download and run spybot and it found tons of errors but couldnt fix them. I have no clue where it is coming from, or if she is downloading something that she forgot to tell me about which is spawning the popups. Does anyone have any suggestions or ideas on what might be wrong, or what I should look for?
 
1. read the unofficial official tweaking guide -- specifically about how to clean spyware.

2. make a CD of
A) latest Windows Updates (you can go to www.windowsupdates.com and choose "administrator" or what not and just download installable updates themselves)
B)AVG Anti-Virus with the latest definitions
C) Spybot S&D w/ latest def's
D) Lavasoft AdAware SE 1.06 personal w/ latest def's
E) Kerio Personal Firewall (or Zone Alarm)

3. reformat her hard drive low level style, use DBAN (get it at www.ultimatebootcd.com , read the documentation--it'll explain what i'm talking about -- you'll need it before you start screwing with her anyways)

4. re-install WinXP (make sure she's disconnected from the internet)

5. install all the anti-virus/spyware apps off your cd

6. install the firewall

7. kill the Messenger service (google for instructions if you don't know how yet, hint: look in the Start / Run: services.msc)

8. Install the Windows Updates

9. Run all the apps (AVG/S&D/AdAware -- Alexa comes bundled w/ WinXP, just a heads up)

10. THEN connect her to the internet and moderate what she downloads.
 
Rather than formatting everything, I'd put lavasoft's adaware and spybot on a CD, and boot into safemode without networking, and go from there. There is a far better chance of cleaning up all your spyware.
 
DamienThorn said:
Rather than formatting everything, I'd put lavasoft's adaware and spybot on a CD, and boot into safemode without networking, and go from there. There is a far better chance of cleaning up all your spyware.
Click to expand...
the OP might as well reformat--that way he or she is sure to get it right the first time, and it'll last.

btw, he or she tried reformatting and spyware was still around, so a low-level format sounds in order.
 
Yeah, but he didn't reveal what was there. I mean, if I have a fresh install of XP, and don't connect to the net, I can still find Alexa. Also, depending on what software is also on the computer, it may be installing spyware with the install. Without knowing whether or not there is a massive host of different stuff, or if it's just Alexa or other "spyware" issues that come with windows itself, it seems rather rash to recommed a full format.

Also, I don't know of any spyware that is capable of withstanding a regular format. I think that a low-level format is just a tad extreme for this situation, though certainly not a bad idea when you're going to format your computer anyways.

To the OP; does your friend use filesharing software? It's well known that hosts of the file sharing clients come bundled with spyware, and if I'm not mistaken some will reinstall itself when the program is fired up again. Without knowing all of the software that is being installed on your friends computer when you do a fresh install of windows, and how you're installing the SPs (ie going to windows update or installing from CD). For the builds I do at work, I NEVER connect to the net until I've installed at least SP2, have a firewall and antivirus running, and then the first thing I do in run windows updates. Doing anything other than this means that you're almost certain to have spyware and/or viruses within the first 30 minutes of using the PC.

Oh, and one other thing. I presume that you haven't had multiple anti-virus programs running at once, right? They tend not to play nicely with one another, and can cause massive problems if multiple antivirus programs are running at once.
 
OMG EET HAWNTED!?

Put it on eBay, quick. Say that ghosts got inside of it. Watch it skyrocket to $5,000!
 
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