Need help with recurring virus

Hi guys, a couple weeks ago I was watching a stream on twitch.tv and my browser closed and a fake Windows Security Center popped up and started running a scan telling me I had to get the premium Windows security (I don't recall the exact name of what it was telling me I needed to get). Anyway I opened the task manager and saw a bunch of processes called "aak.exe" running so I figured that was the virus. I used "end process tree" to shut them all down then tried to run Avira (I had Avira and PrevX3.0 both running on my machine at the time). When I tried to open any program (Firefox, any program) it immediately hijacked that command and the fake antivirus started scanning again. I again shut it down with task manager and each time I tried to open something I'd have to go through the whole "open with" process and find the launcher. In the mean time I ran scans with Avira and PrevX3.0 and both found no problems so I opened firefox again to get the virus prompt and found the location of the .exe file from the task manager (it had put aak.exe into the C:\users\xxxxxx\AppData\Local folder). I deleted aak.exe and then tried to open Firefox again, but again had to go through the "open with" process. I downloaded CCleaner thinking the virus had forced all my applications to run through the aak.exe location which I had deleted. I cleaned my registry and everything worked fine so I figured I had gotten rid of it.

A week later the same problem occurred but instead of it been aak.exe it was running through ibh.exe. The file was in the same location and I took the same steps to temporarily fix it.

Since then I've run Lavasoft's AdAware and Avast and both have come up clean. Anyone have any help before I have to take that horrible plunge and reformat?

Hi there
I keep saying to people that the ONLY 100% successful way to cleanse a computer is to restore a CLEAN image from a recent backup --- if you don't have one then a new re-install is required.

I certainly would NEVER trust a "Cleansed" computer --- if AV software can't be guaranteed to be 100% effective why should we expect "cleansing" software to be 100% effective either.

Keep your OS / Programs on different drive(s) / partition(s) to your data / music / email etc.

BACKUP regularly -- plenty of good backup stuff out there -- Macrium, Acronis, Paragon etc etc.

These will also create bootable restore USB's / DVD's too so you can even recover after wiping the whole HDD clean.

A typical W7 restore will take at the most around 25 mins -- so BACKUP regularly -- it will save NO END OF HASSLE in these circumstances. You will generally only need to recover the OS partition -- your data will remain intact.

As an added level of protection you could create a W7 Virtual machine and ONLY do your web surfing from that machine. Then if it gets infected just ditch it and load a new VM. (When you create a VM you can "clone" it as well. Keep several clones available in case you have to get rid of a VM).

Cheers
jimbo

@Jacee
No, I don't have Advanced Anti-Keylogger. When I get back from work I'll do what you told me and post a log.

As an aside, what I find interesting is two different .exe files have been the source of my problem (aak.exe and ibh.exe), is this a common thing for malware or trojans? The second time it occurred (with ibh.exe as the problem) Avast wanted me to "sandbox" my browser when I opened it, but again said my system was clean when I ran the scan.

Hi there
Just bite the bullet -- forget the "Monday Morning Quarterbacking" -- whatever went wrong has gone wrong and it really in this situation isn't any point in trying to analyse Why or How -- just FIX IT.

To Fix it I'd go for either of the solutions outlined in the my previous post in this thread. Also consider the VM option two.

Any other course of action will take you AGES and you can never be 100% certain that the problem has been REALLY solved.

Cheers
jimbo

Hi everyone
I still think my solution (recover from a good backup or re-install) is the only sensible solution in this situation.

Had the OP followed one of my original suggestions --he would be UP AND RUNNING with a 100% clean computer had he done this between NOW (GMT 21.50) and the time of my previous post approx 2 hrs before..

Sometimes -- and I address this even to real GURU type guys -- time spent on analysing a "One off" type of scenario just isn't worth it if you can fix the entire problem using alternative methods that don't rely on post analysing the the original problem.

As an Engineer -- I just want to get stuff working again. If I'm the designer etc I would probably be more interested in the "Why it broke" scenario but in general I just want "to get the show on the road again" as fast as possible.

Cheers
jimbo