Antivir Antivirus Is a Virus

Hi everyone,

I was up on the web, the other night and caught a pretty interesting computer virus. I was using this site, among others, so I'm not sure where it cam from.

This virus basically makes you think you have a really, really, bad virus and keeps serving you up ads to buy their bogus antivirus software. Then, it won't even let you online to renew or buy Norton or any of the other legit antiviurses. It actually does this by messing with your LAN settings in Internet Explorer and making up some kind of fake proxy server deal, so you can't get on to the real internet.

I was able to remove the Antivir virus thing, following these instructions:
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-removal/remove-antivir-solution-pro

The jyst of the removal process this:

1. Shut down your PC.
2. Start it up in Safe Mode (Keep pressing F8 repeatedly as your computer starts up). When you get to the little DOS menu, choose the option of starting in Safemode with Networking. You need the networking because you'll need to get on to the net for later steps.
3. Open up IE and go into Internet Options, then Connections, then LAN settings, then you have to un-check this proxy sever setting. Part of the virus is that it checks this and makes it's own proxy.
4. Go up on the net and download this thing called rkill.com. Run it, but don't restart after. This didn't seem to do a whole lot but it was fast anyway.
5. Next download a free version of Malwarebytes, using the link in the instructions. You need the full version, but not the paid enterprise version.
6. Run this, it took about 90 minutes altogether for mine.
7. Then, remove the problems it finds and let it restart your machine in normal mode.

Admittedly, I think this whole problem could have been avoided by just using Firefox as a browser instead of Explorer. I think this particular virus is more of an Explorer problem. After that I downloaded and installed AVast, which is supposed to be a good free anti-virus software.

Hope you don't get this one and good luck.

I got hit on the home computer a few months back. Problem was, with the computer down, I couldn't get online to find the instructions to get rid of it.

Generally called malware, BTW. BKH

I actually ran into the issue as well of not being able to get to instructions with my computer infected. I had to research it and print at work and then bring the directions home. It took me a couple days before I had the time etc. to fix it. Luckily I wasn't using my home computer for business.

Actually, a co-worker suggested the UBuntu, and gave me a disk with it. I ran it from the disk, and it worked pretty well, but I had trouble getting it to recognize by wireless network. But, it's definitely a good option to have.

Bri892001 wrote: Actually, a co-worker suggested the UBuntu, and gave me a disk with it. I ran it from the disk, and it worked pretty well, but I had trouble getting it to recognize by wireless network. But, it's definitely a good option to have.

Have you tried the latest version (Lucid Linux- 10.04)? It is quite an improvement over previous releases. I've installed it on 6 PC's so far and it's pretty impressive. Besides one old HP flatbed scanner I have, everything has worked right out of the box even supports Ipod and Iphone right out of the box. For what most home users do with their PC, (web surfing, email, pics, music) it's perfect. and, if you need to have windows, you can still run it as a virtual machine or set your machine up to dual boot. Best of all, it's free, and you are unlikely to get any viruses or malware, since almost all of it is written for Windows. It runs pretty fast on older hardware too.

If anyone wants to try it out, you can download it and run it from a CD to get a feel for it before you install.

Ubuntu

8122pbrainard wrote: Any comments on Google Chrome? Shortly after we went with fiber optic at home, AT&T suggested it. We did have Firefox and were having some problems. Of course I can't remember what they were! None since the change.

I haven't used Chrome either, but I keep telling myself I need to try it out, I'm just so used to FF and happy with it I don't want to use anything else.

As a side note, Google recently ditched all of their Microsoft desktop OS machines. I guess if you are lucky enough to become a Google employee, you have a choice between a Mac or a Linux OS, No MS!

I want to work at Google! Life at Google

Working at Google