is this a virus?

[pyonir]

I am using WINME at home on a Dell thru a cable modem. ok, first off, when i boot up and try to boot in safe mode, it tells me there is a keyboard malfunction. from that point on it boots up and the mouse and keyboard are disabled. when i finally get it booted up and functional, when i try to start Norton Anti-virus or Zonealarm, they either do not open or they open for a couple mintues then automatically shut down. i noticed once in a while all my tray items in the taskbar start to close and go away. i did find a file that i am not sure what it is and was created and modified when this started happening. It is in the system folder and is titled "SHELLMSN.EXE" is that a known trojan or virus? if it is, how do i delete it if i can't start in safe mode? do i have to reformat? i am at work, and have no computer to sign on the internet to from home, so i can't really tell you anything more unless i noticed it last night. any ideas would be greatly apprectiated. THanks all

EDIT: btw, i can't get webpages to load thru my cable modem or dialup thru aol

 

[DAM]

I dont think it a virus, I did a search in sarc and nothing, however, run your virus scanner, you do have a virus scanner right?


btw, imho its probably that crappy OS called ME, format and install a real OS.




dam()

 

[pyonir]

<< I dont think it a virus, I did a search in sarc and nothing, however, run your virus scanner, you do have a virus scanner right?


btw, imho its probably that crappy OS called ME, format and install a real OS. >>



i can't run my virus scanner. as i said, it shuts the program down. and yes i know about ME but it came with the comp and i really dont have the funds to get a new one. besides that really isnt helping me.

according to a tech junkie here at work he thinks it is a nimda version. it is doing excatly to my computer what it did to his brothers and that was nimda.

 

[bacillus]

do you have messanger on your pc?

 

[WhoDeeny]

When you installed your virus scanner it prompted you to create a virus scanning boot disc, you DID do that didn't you?

 

[pyonir]

<< do you have messanger on your pc? >>


no. not that i have ever used or opened.

 

[pyonir]

<< When you installed your virus scanner it prompted you to create a virus scanning boot disc, you DID do that didn't you? >>


nope norton was already preinstalled by dell

 

[DAM]

well, i say grab your install disk that come with your delland resinstall everything.




dam()

 

[WhoDeeny]

Yeah I agree with DAM, assuming you made no physiacl changes to your set up that could have affected these issue you're now having?
The least you should do is format your entire drive, and any partition as if this were a virus its more likely gotten into eveything on your pc and you'd rather not risk re-infecting your system after everything's installed. If you're having problems still after you format and get eveything installed, its possible the virus got into the boot sector of your drive. In that event you're going to need to use FDISK...

Welcome to the world of the "infected..." its niether a nice place to visit nor to live...

 

[LeStEr]

Sounds to me like its a virus and quite possibly nimda. I had nimda too and managed to get it off thought it was a real pain in the ass and very time consuming. My opinion, format after its all said and done you will thank yourself and the virus will be gone for sure.

 

[BDawg]

<< I dont think it a virus, I did a search in sarc and nothing >>



A lot of virii create .exes with randomly generated names. Of course, SHELLMSN would be to much of a coincidence to be random.

I agree, fry the bitch and start over!

 

[pyonir]

damn f!@!@$##%!#%#!$#!#$!#$!#$%%$%#@! i didnt want to have to format. i guess that'll teach me. dammit. this sucks. :|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|:|

i guess the bright side is, i didn't get hit in the groin with a tennis ball.

 

[Hossenfeffer]

<< i guess the bright side is, i didn't get hit in the groin with a tennis ball. >>

Yet.

 

[Hossenfeffer]

You could try an online virus scan or download a panda antivirus from download.com or somethin. (Hmm, just realized you said you can't boot up at all. doh.) Could have been a virus messing with the BIOS.

You could try downloading the removal tools that sarc has listed. Put them on a few floppies and see what they find on your machine. There's a small chance that you could fix your problem -or- at least get a sense of whether it's a virus or not.

In regards to SHELLMSN.EXE, there's a decent possibility that it's a file created by a virus. Didn't receive a single page/reference when searching for SHELLMSN.EXE at Google which tells me it's likely a random filename.

 

[BDawg]

FYI, you can boot from the Norton AV CD and repair some viruses.

 

[pyonir]

thanks for the help everyone. i got home and reinstalled ME and booted up in safe mode. from there i deleted the "shellmsn.exe" file and all is good. everything is running smooth so far and i haven't had any problems YET. appreciate all the great help everyone gives on here.