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General discussion

Spyware got me!!!

Mar 14, 2004 9:44PM PST

I am going to share my experience with spyware that occurred over the weekend...
It started uneventful until my "www.msn.com" homepage was mysteriously taking me to a search page. No matter what I did I couldn't get back to msn.com... My virus checker didn't pick up anything and running ad-aware picked up a couple objects. I cleaned it up and rebooted... Same problem, I was stuck on that search page. Trying to go to Google still took me to that page.... Then I was bombarded with Casino popups...From there I saw a Lycos toolbar appear on the bottom of my screen... Running ad-aware again resulted in over 350 objects!! I cleaned up the temp files, removed all the objects and rebooted... Ad-aware didn't pick up anything on reboot but when I started my browser it took me back to that search page... Then all 350 objects were back!! "Golden Palace Casino" had somehow installed itself on my PC along with "Internet Optimizer" and some other junk...

After fooling around with trying to clean it up for about 45 minutes I just got fed up, reformatted and reinstalled the previous day's backup... It only took up about 90 minutes total of my time and I still don't know what I did!!!

My ugliest spyware experience to date.... Sad I don't know what I missed but I tried everything I could think of to solve the problem and it just wouldn't go away.. Then frustration set in....

All is well now Happy

Discussion is locked

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By the way....
Mar 14, 2004 11:10PM PST

What is MALWARE? I see that's what Golden Palace Casino is, which is one of the programs that infected my PC.

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Found it. Malicious Software :) NT
Mar 14, 2004 11:29PM PST

NT

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Re:Spyware got me!!!
Mar 29, 2004 8:53AM PST

Travis, I am having the exact same problem. How did you fix it? I am so mad at that browser after this.

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Re:Re:Spyware got me!!!
Mar 29, 2004 10:39AM PST
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Re:Re:Spyware got me!!!
Mar 29, 2004 10:41AM PST

Travis:
spyware??? Perhaps, but it sounds more like the cool websearch bug.
Download and run the CW shredder. It should take care of your problem.
Two other must have programs are Spybot s&d and the Ad-aware 6 program.
Good luck.

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Re:Re:Spyware got me!!!
Mar 29, 2004 2:44PM PST

I also had the same problem although on a ME system. I tried most of the same fixes. Spybot, deleted all cookies, internet temporary files and just in case, my current history. Then I went back and rebooted and got back on the internet and got the same load dumped on me again. This time after doing all the above fixes, I did a restore from a week ago, rebooted and my computer seems normal now for about 2 days. I'm sure that I picked up whatever caused my problem by going to a site from "Google" although I don't blame Google.

So, my advice is to backup and keep a good restore point for the recovery.

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Re:Spyware got me!!!
Mar 30, 2004 2:13AM PST
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If you don't wish to use "system restore"
Oct 25, 2007 2:10PM PDT

System restore works great, but sometimes it gets rid of things you've done since your restore point that you wish to keep, for example ms word documents. So here's another way of handling your issue

First, take a look at the problem. For example, if you go into your browser and a page you don't recognize as something you would visit comes up, write it down. Make a list of anything the malware might be called as a file.

Now follow these steps:
- Go to the Start menu
- Click in the icon "Run"
- Type "regedit" into the blank. This will open a window called the Registry Editor
- The following may be confusing, just follow the steps exactly as they appear:
- Double click the folder called "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE"
- Double click the folder called "SOFTWARE"
- Double click the folder called "Microsoft"
- Double click the folder called "Windows"
- Double click the folder called "Current Version"
- SINGLE click the folder called "Run"
-The items you see are start up items.
-If you see anything suspicious, i.e. anything on your list of possible malware names, delete it by right clicking and selecting "delete"
*WARNING* DO NOT DELETE ANYTHING IF YOU AREN'T SURE IT IS BAD! This could result in an issue with your operating system! Which would be a good use for your restore point...

Now press F5. If the item you deleted shows up again, it is not only planted in your run registry, but it is running in the background, and manifesting itself whenever it is deleted. In this case, restart your computer in Safe Mode, and follow the above steps in Safe Mode.

Then delete the files out of the Program Files folder.

I got rid of a couple AIM viruses in this manner.

Hope this was helpful!

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After over 3 years, I suspect this problem is solved.
Oct 25, 2007 8:47PM PDT

As this discussion is dated 2004 I would guess the problem has now been solved one way or another.

Mark

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Thanks
Oct 27, 2007 12:13AM PDT

Other people check these things when they need help too, so maybe it can help others. But thanks for your constructive feedback