Ok, so somehow my kids got on my laptop and installed this cheesy “AntiVirus” program, but it’s more like a virus in and of itself. It is causing continuous pop ups, so much so that it is causing it to crash. I tried deleting this “program” every way I can think of, even going into the Program Files folder itself. I will delete the folder and a few minutes later, it’ll pop up wanting to do a virus scan !
I went to get on a little while ago and it was doing a “Virus Scan” and I noticed there were about 6000 windows open on the task bar, so I tried Control-Alt-Del and it just froze, I had to take the battery out of it to get it to shut down.
If this is a program, how in thee fuck can I get it off my computer? If it’s a virus, what is a good, free virus/adware scanner/destroyer?
Please, anyone…help.
P.S. I also tried to do a System Restore and it wouldn’t let me.
I am running a pretty new HP laptop with Windows XP
I hope this isn’t too snarky, but you’ve not mentioned the name of the program. Also, IME, entering “remove [program]” into Google almost always brings up some forum post that explains what to do, even if you have to edit the registry by hand. Many times someone has been made angry enough to make a small application that will do it for you.
I was going to look this morning for the name of it, but it turned out that it was a virus and it was so bad that Windows shut itself down to prevent anymore damage, I got the semi-blue screen of death. It was so bad that the virus wouldn’t let me online with ANY browser, I couldn’t even restore to factory defaults. Nothing worked.
So, now my computer’s OS won’t even boot up unless it’s in safe mode and for some reason in safe mode on this computer, I can’t get online. So off to Best Buy Geek Squad I go. This thing was really nasty. When I get the name of the virus, I’ll post it so you stay away from it.
I would love to see the person who created this virus behind bars for a few hundred years or so…
It’s a malware program. Malbytes malware remover will take care of it. Of course, you gotta be on-line to download, but maybe you can have a friend download and put on a disk for you.
My daughter’s computer got infected by back-to-back malware, even though we pay the $50/year to get the Norton antivirus subscription (Thanks, Symantec!). The first one was called “Microsoft Antivirus” and looked legit upon first blush. It was easily removed when we manually downloaded the latest antivirus definitions from Norton’s website (why the Auto update didn’t do it is beyond me). The second appeared within a half hour and was called something like “Spyware Remover”. I ended up yahooing the name and was led to a (free) Malware remover program, which worked like a charm.
The malware installs itself onto your computer and taskbar and claims that it’s searched your harddrive and displays alarming phony “results” which lists all sorts of crap. It then barrages you with alarming messages about how your computer has been infiltrated by spyware and someone could be recording all of your passwords, and you need to buy antivirus protection immediately. It then links you to a phony antivirus site. Of course, they’re just after your credit card number under the guise of purchasing AntiVirus software. The malware is insidious and constantly pops up (as in every minute). A few things tipped me off that it was malware:
It popped up every minute or so.
It did a “scan” without asking for permission.
I went to “Remove Programs” and it wasn’t listed.
It wouldn’t let me x out of it. Only Alt F4 would momentarily kill it.
I right clicked on the icon, and found where it was hiding under “properties.” It wouldn’t let me delete the execution file, saying it was Copyright protected.
The phony “scan” took just a minute or two. Anyone who’s ever done a real scan of their files knows that it takes a long time.
The website didn’t offer advice for how to uninstall it or give a number for technical advice.
That’s the Antivirus XP 2008/2009 spyware. It is nasty and very aggressive.
The one sure cleaning tool for it is malwarebytes at http://malwarebytes.org. I’ve used it many times to clean badly infected computers.
It’s a problem for a lot of people and hard to remove without Malwarebytes. It does nasty things like shutting off your automatic updates, and hiding from McAfee, Ad-Aware, and other antivirus tools. I’ve seen it try to download on thin clients and have heard reports of it trying to install itself on Macs (it can’t, but it does use scripts that are used by Mac browsers to download it).
A NY Times article a few months ago said that the people “selling” the software make an estimated $5 million a year. People get fooled an pay to “clean” their computer (it doesn’t). In addition, they now have those people’s credit card numbers. In addition, they use infected computers as bots to extort money from sites online.