Windows 7: S.M.A.R.T. HDD Program: Who Are These Jokers ?

Hello,



Boy, talk about being annoyed.

All of a sudden some "program" by S.M.A.R.T. HDD (or something like that) appeared and keeps doing scans of my PC with msgs that my HD has loads of faults, etc.

Kept coming back.
No way to close it out. Won't allow itself to be closed out.
Doesn't appear in my list when I go to Remove Programs.

They want $ to effect a cure of the 7 "problems" it supposedly found.

Totally corrupted everything.
Had to do a System Restore, with about a weeks worth of stuff lost.

Be advised.
Who are these jokers ?

How do I keep it from coming back, again ?

Anyone that you can report this too, who might actually do something about ?

Thanks,
Bob

What AV/AM are you running?

i just got that one last night and its a B**** to get ridof. but there are some simple steps to help.

first go into safe mode with networking
second install loaris trojan remover
third install malwarebytes
fourth run loaris
fifth run malwarebytes

for the most part that will clean it up, it hides all your files... ALL OF THEM. to make you believe it is hard disk corruption. i used to know a script for cmd that will show all hidden files (that arent meant to be hidden that is). if you dont wnat to manually show them, there are applications to do it specifically designed for use after getting this virus


EDIT: i missed a step, sry:
before downloading the antivirus, install SysInternals, the virus will prevent you from using task manager, so instead use process explorer from sys internals suite, if you search by "private bytes" than it will be near the top with a random numeric value (example: Al2848aDfl%34.exe)

Hi,

Thanks for help.

What is AV / AM please ?

Bob

Hi Robert,

That sounds like rogueware/malware...if you recall the exact name, we can do some research for you. In the meantime, please run this online scan by ESET. Report back on all the threats it finds, if any:

ESET Online Scanner

Post back here if you need more assistance with this.

Regards,
Golden

Nothing should have been corrupted. Those "programs" hold your system hostage, making you think you need to pay for something. As long as people out there continue to be fooled by it and pay...they will exist.

The easiest way to remove this type of malware is to pull the drive an attach it to another system. Scan the drive and clean it...then return it to the original system and run another scan to be sure.

Hi,

Any simpler way than pulling the internal HD ?

Bob

Anti - Virus / Anti - Malware

I use Microsoft Security Essentials; it's free, and quite good.

Not that's completely effective. Pulling the internal hard drive is the simple part. You could spend days fighting it on the active system, or less than an hour to completely remove it.

This type of malware is sometimes picked up by simply loading a web page. They can also be picked up by clicking OK on a dialog box that offers to close a popup web page.
That's one of the main reasons I dual boot from a second drive. I can boot to the other OS if necessary and perform all necessary cleanup/de-lousing.
I've helped a number of folks with difficult infections in XP by walking them through a parallel installation and doing all the scrubbing from there.