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anyone want to help a damsel in distress?

moshquerade

moshquerade

No Lifer
i'd appreciate it.

it seems i have a virus/trojan or something that has taken over my search engine pages like google.com and yahoo.com on my home PC. for example, i do a search on google and it brings up the correct pages with all the correct links, but when i click on a link it takes me to an imposters search site or ad site.

anyone familiar with this?

i have kept AVG, spywareblaster, and spybot updated and have ran them all to no avail.

thanks in advance.
 
You ma'am have been hijacked. Out of curiosity do you use IE or Firefox?

Open regedit and check the following 2 keys

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

Inside these 2 keys are all of the programs windows launches automatically evertime your computer starts. It is also a very common hiding place for virus, trojan, adware, and spyware to launch from. Check and make sure you recognize all of the programs in here. If you find one you don't recognize google search the .exe file before you delete the entry. You should be able to find out very easily if the file is a legitimate device driver or something like that or infact the hijacker your looking to delete.

Hope this helps
 
HijackThis is a great tool for removing spyware, but it's not for newbies, as removing incorrect entries can cause problems.

Download and run it a scan, then you can either post the log here and we'll see what we can find that shouldn't be there, or you can post it here.

EDIT: Just to restate, don't remove anything if you're not completely sure it's spyware.

EDIT #2: Here's a site that gives a little information about the entries you'll find.
 
Originally posted by: Tu13erhead

EDIT: Just to restate, don't remove anything if you're not completely sure it's spyware.
Click to expand...

A-MEN! I've edited my reply as well. I've see problems from joysticks not working to a FUBARed OS requiring a complete reinstall after deleting stuff from the registry. Make sure of what it is before you remove it.
 
Hi, moshquerade:

If you have a Windows computer, it's suggested that you try the following. This suggestion is based on my similar recent experience where McAfee reported zero infections, but Kaspersky found 23 infections. Likewise, maybe your AVG isn't catching everything.:

a) Open IE browser, and NOT Firefox

b) Go here and run the Kaspersky Online Scanner

c) In the box where it asks what to scan, have it scan your entire computer

d) After scan finishes you'll get a report in a small window. This little window may obscure a portion of the path to each infection, but the full report which you can select underneath the little report window will show you the entire path to each infected file. Select the option to save the report as HTML or as text, doesn't matter which.

e) The online scanner report will show you WHAT infections you have, if any, and it'll show you WHERE they are hiding, but the free online scanner won't remove them for you. So go into Windows Explorer and hunt down each infected file (the scan report shows you the complete path to each) and delete it.


 
Originally posted by: stevty2889
Try adaware as well, it usualy finds what spybot doesn't for me.
Click to expand...
Ad-aware won't run a complete scan. it gets stuck, but it does show 11 objects at that point. i tried to run it in Safe Mode too, but it wouldn't complete there either.

 
Originally posted by: ryan256
You ma'am have been hijacked. Out of curiosity do you use IE or Firefox?

Open regedit and check the following 2 keys

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

Inside these 2 keys are all of the programs windows launches automatically evertime your computer starts. It is also a very common hiding place for virus, trojan, adware, and spyware to launch from. Check and make sure you recognize all of the programs in here. If you find one you don't recognize google search the .exe file before you delete the entry. You should be able to find out very easily if the file is a legitimate device driver or something like that or infact the hijacker your looking to delete.

Hope this helps
Click to expand...
i use IE, surprise-surprise, eh?

 
Originally posted by: scott
Hi, moshquerade:

If you have a Windows computer, it's suggested that you try the following. This suggestion is based on my similar recent experience where McAfee reported zero infections, but Kaspersky found 23 infections. Likewise, maybe your AVG isn't catching everything.:

a) Open IE browser, and NOT Firefox

b) Go here and run the Kaspersky Online Scanner

c) In the box where it asks what to scan, have it scan your entire computer

d) After scan finishes you'll get a report in a small window. This little window may obscure a portion of the path to each infection, but the full report which you can select underneath the little report window will show you the entire path to each infected file. Select the option to save the report as HTML or as text, doesn't matter which.

e) The online scanner report will show you WHAT infections you have, if any, and it'll show you WHERE they are hiding, but the free online scanner won't remove them for you. So go into Windows Explorer and hunt down each infected file (the scan report shows you the complete path to each) and delete it.
Click to expand...
i am giving that a try. thanks scott. 🙂

 
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