The Furry Forums
Furry Chat => Tech Central => Topic started by: anoni on July 17, 2013, 06:50:59 PM
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I am almost certain I got a browser virus. It occurred when I downloaded a new Codec to fix up a steam game, which hindsight tells me I probably shouldn't of done, especially since my computer gave me a small warning saying that the codec was going to change some files. So, either way, I got a new tool bar called news.net, which spammed me with a heck lot of advertismenets, Adblocker was blocking them but it still slowed down and screwed up my browser for both mozilla firefox and Chrome. I easily removed and uninstalled the toolbar, thinking that was the end of it, but I've been noticing subtle effects as well.
For one my browsing experience is still slower, I can observe jumps in loading and scrolling itself isn't smooth, with random "bumps" and freezes while scrolling. Despite having adblocker I get pop ups for surveys, but these pop ups aren't normal random pop ups, they are website specific. For example, if I go to google a pop up will appear claiming it is a google survey, if I go to logitech a pop up will appear saying it's a logitech survey, now unless google got hacked, I'm pretty sure there is a spyware on my computer monitoring what websites I access. Some other subtler effects I've noticed happen outside my browser, I hear the sound as if my mouse clicks randomly at times, even if I have not clicked them and as well, for some reason, minimized windows tend to move to the bottom right of my screen, even if I keep them at the top right (After I minimized them).
Now I have a crap AV software installed, I downloaded Microsoft Security Essentials, however I've done some external scans with a microsoft dedicated scanner and malicious software removal tool, but none of these tools can pick up a spyware on my computer, but I am very sure that all these symptons run parallel to what a spyware could be capable of.
So does anyone have any advice on how I can remove this spyware from my computer and purge it's existence?
EDIT: The virus is called the News.net toolbar virus. Generally it doesn't seem like an adaptive virus, I removed all the browser specific toolbars of the virus, but the virus is still on my desktop. A guide has told me to go to control panel to look up the virus and uninstall it there, but doing so leaves no files of interest to be listed. I can't find the news.net toolbar (which is apparently what is causing the virus) in the computers control panel
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You have a few options
1. format your computer
2. use linux to backup your files onto an external hard disk, then format
3. rollback (go back to a previous restore point) your computer, get avast antivirus and run a boot-scan (rollback is optional but a good idea anyway)
Get Avast antivirus!
It's free, has a mass of features and can run a boot-scan which scan your computer for viruses before windows is even running.
What you can also do (though I've never tried it) is boot up linux from a flashdrive and run an antivirus from there. I don't know if that would work though.
I would recommend option 3
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Goodnews! I think I fixed it. There was still one component of the virus remaining, I found it by doing a search (just searching for file names) on my computer and it was nested in C:/programs under the name "breaking news". I couldn't delete it because it was constantly running but after running my computer in safe mode I managed to delete it and empty my recycle bin. So far, my computer seems as fast as it was before, which is excellent.
I'm gonna leave this up just in case, as a warning for people in case they find the same virus and just in case I didn't actually delete it
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I'm gonna have to recommend TrendMicro as an Antivirus program.
Just the free, manual-run program itself is fully capable of killing just about anything, let alone the fact you won't need it to run in the background to use any performance on your machine while doing other tasks. And even if you're into buying AV programs, their Internet Security is what I've used before and I can personally say it's the best experience I've had with an AV program. I never got a virus with it, because it killed anything before it could even infect.
Even certain viruses I'd got before that nearly compromised my entire machine >>
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I'd have to recommend SUPERanti-spyware. My laptop was running really slow, and it turns out I had quite a bit of adware/spyware. After running a scan, my laptop is MUCH faster now!
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This is an excellent review on Bitdefender 2013, software of which I use on my business computer. can't fault it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PVODPQCdSs&feature=youtu.be&t=6m (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PVODPQCdSs&feature=youtu.be&t=6m)
Anoni, I'm pleased you got the beastie fixed. :D
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I would say run a malwarebytes scan on it, not because there's likely to be virus stuff there, but because it probably left junk around.
My lateness is not deliberate BTW, just becuase ummm... the new replies button is more appealing than "11289 unread posts"
either way, good anti-virus is essential in this day and age. personally, I would go for bitdefender or kaspersky, although I've been experiencing some issues with kaspersky related to sleep mode. Avast is good for the most part, but I prefer added protection even when I don't use it.
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Tbh, I had my computer entirely unprotected for a year and a half before I got microsoft essentials, and the only reason I got it was so windows stopped bugging me about my computer being unprotected. I don't usually get viruses, any site that looks shifty I check any files i'm going to download. I was surprised I got this virus though xD