OT: Virus has seriously screwed my laptop

[Bad Ash]

Only thing I can suggest off the top of my head is to boot your laptop into safe mode and try using all your anti-virus and spyware tools then. You could also try booting into safe mode with network support and see if you are able to download updates which aren't corrupt.

 

[NMH]

Download the latest STINGER from
http://vil.nai.com/vil/stinger

This also seems to find viruses and erase them. I sorted out a friend's p/c after her son had been on porn sites. No guarantees, but it seems to work well.

 

[Cian]

Never use Internet Explorer. Never use Outlook Express. Avoid using Microsoft Office, if you must, disable VBA.

Never use more than one virus scanner, they conflict with each other and use effectiveness

Use AdAware

Never let PC World near your PC.

Don't install: Cursor programme, screensavers, background packs, popup blockers, 'porn finders', etc

Avoid game crack sites, porn sites, etc

Don't use Bearshare. Don't use Morpheus. Don 't use Kazaa. If you do fileshare, never download a potentially executable file format

I have *never* got a virus, in over ten years of computing. Using UNIX for a lot of that time probably helped, but I've never got a virus on my machines that can get them - Windows, OS/2, MacOS.

 

[Cian]

Still no answer to the question though - is it possible to hide a virus or spyware in the pictures themselves, and hence f*** up your PC by just looking at the thread, or would we have to be a er... "researcher" like els to get infected?

Yes. It'll only affect Internet Explorer users though, and only those on Windows at that - not people using IE on Solaris, HP-UX or MacOS.

 

[Beach Hut]

Be careful about returning your laptop to PC World for fix, Gary Glitter did it once...............

 

[Cian]

Be careful about returning your laptop to PC World for fix, Gary Glitter did it once...............

Be careful of them in general. They're inept, stupid, fucktards when it comes to software - when it comes to fixing a PC, they think a reformat does it best.

 

[DTES]

Yes.

Sorry to sound a little patronising, but 'yes' doesn't exactly answer an 'a or b' type question

Is that a 'yes you can be infected by looking at pictures', or 'yes you have to actually visit the sites'..?

 

[beorhthelm]

A word of warning to you all: Do not rely on Mozilla/Firefox to keep you safe from internet nasties. Yes they are a good prevention right now and you should use them, but their popularity is increasing and it wont be long until viruses exploit weaknesses in them.

Be sensible about where you go on the internet, what you click on to "agree", and downloads. And keep up to date with the patches for your OS and browser (though i wouldnt recommend setting Automatic update on)

 

[geoffreyp]

mate i had an absolute mother fukker virus.

these guys http://forums.thatcomputerguy.us/ were superb and i would strongly recomemnd you use them fr any future probs too!

i'll second that. they got me out of a similar situation as yours recently

 

[Westdene Seagull]

If you know the name of the virus' you've got then look at

Sophos

for decent cleaning instructions. You used to be able to download a copy of Sophos but I think they've stopped that now.

 

[eastlondonseagull]

Posted a very long-winded message on ThatComputerGuy's help forum yesterday, and got a decent reply back with advice on procedures to follow, so will work on them tonight when back home. Never realised that such a great 'help' community was out there. Nor that you guys know so much about all this.

Think it may take a while to solve, but I will not be taking my PC down PCWorld - thanks for all your advice!!

 

[Barnet Seagull]

It's all a bit melodramatic, all this mozilla/firefox, dont use OE or VBS etc.

Basic principles are this.

Keep ALL of your software up to date.
Use an internet firewall
Use up to date virus software
Run spyware removal (ad-aware) from time to time.

Trick is to block everything and say no to everything and download nothing unless it stops you doing what you need to.

Then can use any OS and Web browser you like.

 

[Wozza]

I have *never* got a virus, in over ten years of computing. Using UNIX for a lot of that time probably helped

Aren't you, like, 18?

 

[Cian]

Aren't you, like, 18?

Yes. However, highly techie family, got my first PC of my own in late 1990.

As goes the early question - just looking at the pictures can cause viruses, but only if you're using IE.

 

[Cian]

A word of warning to you all: Do not rely on Mozilla/Firefox to keep you safe from internet nasties. Yes they are a good prevention right now and you should use them, but their popularity is increasing and it wont be long until viruses exploit weaknesses in them.

Except for one difference, which is that Firefox is inherently more secure, and has the major advantage that, unlike IE, its regularly updated. IE won't be updated properly until Windows Longhorn which could be 2007.

 

[beorhthelm]

Except for one difference, which is that Firefox is inherently more secure, and has the major advantage that, unlike IE, its regularly updated. IE won't be updated properly until Windows Longhorn which could be 2007.

This sort of mis-information that is potential dangerous. Yes Firefox is more secure than IE, but not totally, 100%, iron clad, exploit proof. Its only a matter of time before Mozilla/Firefox is used to spread some malware, which given the degree of trust it is now recieving, could be potentially more damaging than the many IE holes. And the updates count for shit if the user is not applying them.

 

[alan partridge]

Yes. However, highly techie family, got my first PC of my own in late 1990.

As goes the early question - just looking at the pictures can cause viruses, but only if you're using IE.

so you were 3 or 4 when you had your first PC?

bit odd

 

[SWD]

Yes. It'll only affect Internet Explorer users though, and only those on Windows at that - not people using IE on Solaris, HP-UX or MacOS.

IE on Solaris

 

[eastlondonseagull]

It's all a bit melodramatic, all this mozilla/firefox, dont use OE or VBS etc.

Basic principles are this.

Keep ALL of your software up to date.
Use an internet firewall
Use up to date virus software
Run spyware removal (ad-aware) from time to time.

Trick is to block everything and say no to everything and download nothing unless it stops you doing what you need to.

Then can use any OS and Web browser you like.

The irony, Barnet, is that I had done pretty much all of that.

I have a firewall switched on at all times;
I had a fully-updated version of Norton running at the time;
Spyhunter was run every fortnight or so;
two pop-up blockers were running;
other than a few jpegs, the only thing I'd recently downloaded was Windows Messenger 7 (Beta) - maybe that was the problem? - No other exe files.
And whenever Norton warned that a malicious script had arrived, I'd follow all the necessary actions. Then the PC just sort of exploded into viral chaos! Very bizarre.

But to quote the chap from ThatComputerGuy: "Welcome to the boards. You've been hit hard by these different scum, but no worries, we'll try our best to get you back on your feet and working like normal."

 

[Cian]

IE on Solaris

Yes, Internet Explorer 5 for Sun Microsystems Solaris. Its on Microsofts site somewhere. Its crap.

Yes, I was 3 when I got my first PC. A lot of kids are 3 when they get their first console these days, whats the difference?

Firefox is inherently more secure because its NOT A SYSTEM SERVICE. Also, hackers rarely attack what they use - thats why theres so few security holes known in FreeBSD. Being opensource helps because it means that glaring holes will be found earlier. Mozilla *pay* people to find them security holes, theres a $500 bounty for finding one in the wild. Its fully cross platform so bugs are found easier. IE has none of those advantages - its a system service, its closed source, they discourage bug reports, its no longer cross platform. Its inherently insecure.