Computer (Not mine) infected with scam window. How to fix?

Jack Bando · #1 09-02-2006, 12:05 AM

I was using a relative's PC while at thier house today, and saw they had a virus on thier PC. It's a window that says something like "YOUR PC HAS SEVERE REGISTRY ERRORS! GO TO (website) TO DOWNLOAD A PROGRAM TO FIX THS BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!" (The website changes to a few different ones)

Sidenote:They had NO ANTI-ANYTHING on their PC. 4+ year old PC. I did a partial scan with AVG, picked up 550+ trojans/worms. Notepad was infected. I even think Explorer.exe was as well. I didn't even get a chance to scan with Ad-Aware.

Back to the main point. That box also infected my father's laptop a year or two ago, and he had to do a complete hard drive wipe. Now, I'm wondering if there's a way to stop this box before we get to that point.

Sidenote 2, Rant: What is it with people and PC's nowadays!?! It's not a toy, it possibly holds every important thing about you that a thief wants. You don't let strangers watch you do your taxes or look at your credit cards, but the magic fun box on your table is safe?!

Thanks for reading and helping if you can.

wonderwes · #2 09-02-2006, 12:10 AM

adaware or spyboy might be able to disable it. This is in the startup script when windows boots up. You can load procexp.exe to see the current programs running in registry.

You can also download mcafee virus scan for a free trial.

The best way to solve it, is load a restore point to a period when you know it is not installed. Most XP machines have the system restore already turned on.

Also clear out the entire browser cache and make sure to go into the control panel and check with unwanted applications are installed on add/remove programs.

beating nero · #3 09-03-2006, 01:06 PM

If a PC is that badly infected I would say its best to re-install the operating system from scratch. THen put on a good firewall and AV before its allowed on the web!!

Jack Bando · #4 09-03-2006, 04:36 PM

Thanks for the replies guys. I probably won't fix it anymore because it's not mine, they're not asking, and I don't care anymore.

They called me the next day because AVG was popping up and telling them about Trojans/worms. Not "Oh noes, what do I do to fix this?" more like "How do I stop this box from coming up?" Yes, don't get the fire extingusiher when the house is on fire, turn off the smoke detector. Ugh.