Advice on this Windows Security Essentials screenshots pls

eknirb · 11 Jul 2012

These SSs are from my wife's PC. Last night, she clicking on an image of Lake Tahoe, of a hotel we are looking to stay at..and she got a virus. BAM. Right? Now, her PC used to be mine. It had Malwarebytes, Superantispyware on there from when I used it. I noticed they weren't on there any longer. Curious. I had also installed for her, MSFT Security Essentials. Didn't see that, either. VERY curious. She insists she uninstalled nothing, and I believe her.

So. I installed MWB..SASW..and also SE. Ran all three. MWB found 4 bad things and quarantined. SASW was clean. You see here in SS #1 the result of the SE scan. It still located those- which I then REMOVED.

I restarted as prompted, and it still shows what you see in SS #2. It has discovered the initial bad file, and wants another re-start, it's third. (Also asked for a re-start upon installing and initial run last nite.)

Looking at the SS#2, I went to the path and found that .exe....and there it was like an apple for the picking, and I deleted it.

Your thoughts?

Petey7 · 11 Jul 2012

There are a number of viruses that remove or disable installed security software. It sounds like you had one hell of trojan. If you look at screenshot #1 you will see that all of them are the same files found at different times. To help prevent the situation from repeating itself, I would make sure UAC is on. I would also consider using the paid version of MBAM. It is one time fee of $25 for life. It is also pretty common for them to have some kind of promotional code. I was able to find a valid one through google for 10% off when I bought it. It can (and should) be run along side MSE on 7 and Vista without conflict. If I recall they have some trouble running along side each other on XP.

eknirb · 11 Jul 2012

so does it look like I got it all?

and PS not awake yet---UAC is.......what?

Petey7 · 11 Jul 2012

User Account Control. It creates a dialog box asking for your permission when you try to install a program or a program tries to make changes on your computer. See here: User Account Control - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A lot of people turn it off because they find the dialog box annoying but there it does alert you when a piece of malware tries to make changes. There has been a couple time that has kept a virus from installing itself on one of my computers and I have had a number of friends and family members say the same thing. Some malware can by pass it, but when it comes to internet security, every little bit helps.

As for whether or not you got everything, you've done a good job so far, but its hard to be 100% sure. Run another full scan with MSE, MBAM, and SASw. Also you can run a scan using ESET Online Scanner. It runs the scan from within your web browser, so you don't need to install anything. Also, I believe MBAM is still doing a 30-day free trial of the Pro version. Might want to try that out to see if it is to your liking.

eknirb · 11 Jul 2012

User...Account...Control. I knew that! I did! heh. :)