Uh, where'd my virus go?

[dravenzouk]

Here's one for you computer savvy folks.

 

I replaced my laptop a while ago. But I hung on to the old one, and kept it as a "backup". I also continued to use the old one for odd work.

 

Well it (the old one) got a virus (my first!). Basically some "anti-virus" software showed up on it and kept popping up windows telling me I need (urgently!) to sign up and save my computer from evil viruses. At first it was just annoying but after a couple of weeks they starting popping up ALL the time. Like every 5 seconds or so. This made it essentially impossible to use the computer. I tried to delete the program with no luck. I tried to load stuff like MalWarebytes and other programs to attack it and they wouldn't even load. There was nothing on this computer that I couldn't lose, so I attempted to wipe it and start clean, or to reboot to an earlier time before the virus hit. Nope. It wouldn't let me do ANYTHING; I couldn't even shut the computer off.

 

So I forced it off, and just put it away. I had no time to deal with it, and I didn't really need it for anything so I just pushed it aside.

 

That was two months ago. A friend of mine is something of a computer tech and he told me he could probably get rid of the virus and save my computer (he'd done it with a similiar problem from someone else). So I figured, why not? Let him have a go.

 

So just about an hour ago, I turned the thing back on just to see if possibly I could get into it enough just to see if maybe there might be a file or two on there I had forgotten but didn't want to lose (I told the friend he could wipe it if need be). But........ now it seems just fine. Everything works and there's no sign of any virus, problem, or glitch anywhere. I've even done a couple of sweeps - it's clean.

 

 

This makes no sense. Surely this nasty little bug didn't just go away. So, the question is: where is it?

[lUserName]

I'm no computer wiz by a long shot. I think the virus may have been activating itself through "System Restore" and your computer hasn't made a new "restore point" since you shut it off. When you turned it back on the restore dates were too far back to access.

If this happens again you should , disable system restore, BUT only if all else fails because you WILL lose all restore points. Restart in Safe Mode then run Malwarebytes, etc...

 

CCLeaner is another great free program that will clean the Registry of "leftovers". it has a few other good things that it can do such as let you choose which cookies you don't want deleted when you clear cookies.

 

Then there's always the possibilty that the virus is in a program that you haven't accessed yet since turning the comp back on.

[dravenzouk]

Thanks for the tips.

 

The last time I had this computer on, the virus was in full attack mode. It wouldn't let me do anything. I couldn't do a System Restore. I couldn't load/run MalWarebytes. Nothing. It wouldn't even let me shut the damn thing off.

 

But I did force it off a few times to try and reboot. Even in Safe Mode, it wouldn't let me do anything. And everytime I rebooted, the virus just came up immediately and started popping up every few seconds. Eventually I just gave up and left it off.

 

But now, after two months of just sitting off, it's okay? I don't trust that.

[lUserName]

np

 

Malwarebytes updates often so they may have the definition files of the virus that you had by now. If you still have malwarebytes I'ld update it and run a scan. If it comes up clean then I would think that it is.

Malwarebytes is the only program that has solved major problems for me. Adaware and Spybot S&D were useless imo. They could find a virus but never get rid of it.

[toolbar]

you can probably get it back easy enough. Just visit a few hacker or porn sites.