Windows 7 - PUM.Hidden.Desktop

Hello Guys

Malwarebytes flagged the following reg entry as malicious and I can't get rid of it. It says its removed but on reboot it reappears.I've tried scanning from Hirens bootable cd, same result it wont budge. MSE, Superantispyware and ESET online find nothing and on doing research it says it can effect desktop icons but hasn't effected my system in any obvious way.

Any help on removing this is much appreciated.



Regards Danny

Hi Danny,

I had the same result from an MBAM scan today and it took me a little time to work it out but (for me at any rate), I usually have my desktop icons hidden (this is set by me manually by right-clicking on the desktop and clicking View -> Show desktop icons).

I do this just to keep my desktop 'clean' looking and switch the icons back to visible if/when I need them.

Bottom-line: when I turned the icons back to visible (View -> Show desktop icons) and ran another scan, MBAM didn't flag anything up; I think this is just MBAM erring on the side of caution if your desktop icons are set to hidden.

I obviously can't say that this is the same situation that you've encountered but it's resolved it for me...

Danny,

PUM's are Potentially Unwanted Modifications - it sounds like Malwarebytes is flagging a hidden icon/s as potetially malicious. It could be a false positive - check it out at the Malwarebytes forums just to be sure.

Regards,
Golden

Thanks guys

Have posted on the Malwarebytes forum and spire13's comments seem to make sense as I'm running the same scenario with desktop icons hidden. Will wait till morning as usually MBAM update there definitions quite quickly when FPs like this occur.
Will post back later though

Danny

Well Mbam updated to a new version this morning and its still flagging it up but it would appear that spire13 was correct and if I tick the show desktop icons box on the desktop context menu it doesn't flag it up. Just going to report it on the Mbam forum as a possible FP.

Thanks

Well, it's not really a false positive in that it's even reported as malicious in any sense of the word.

It's simply exactly what MBAM calls it to begin with: a potentially unwanted modification. One that MBAM is telling you is in itself completely harmless but might not be what you want it to be.

Since you've determined that it is in fact NOT an unwanted modification, feel free to simply add this item to your exclude list on the next scan and be done with it.

(Personally I have two or three of these PUMs too but I've done every one of them myself on purpose. I just had to gently tell MBAM about it.)

I'm getting the same flag on my system too. Glad I checked here before trying to remove it!