Thread: Internet Extortion?

I am suddenly getting popups stating my computer is infected and AntiVirus Software will fix it for $49.95. I scan my computer with Spy Bot Search and Destroy but it says I am not infected. What is this:

Internet Explorer Warning - visiting this web site may harm your computer!
	Most likely causes: The website contains exploits that can launch a malicious code on your computer Suspicious network activity detected There might be an active spyware running on your computer
	What you can try:
	Purchase Spyware Protect 2009 for secure Internet surfing (Recommended).
	Check your computer for viruses and malware.
	More information

How do I make it go away?
Thanks,
Brad

I use Anti-Vir and Adaware, and I don't have any problems with popups. Both programs are free.

There are several solutions to this, and I'll list them in no particular order.

1. Find somebody who has dealt with the exact same bug, and follow their solution.

2. Keep throwing various anti-spyware and anti-adware applications at it until one of them get's it.

3. Switch from IE to Firefox and hope that it's IE specific.

4. Carefully comb through running processes and see if you can figure out which one is responsible, then spend countless hours filtering through the windows registry and your hard drive to get rid of it manually with a HIGH risk of bricking your desktop.

5. Format your hard drive and reinstall everything from scratch. This is equivalent to fixing a car that burns oil by having it torn down to the floor pan and rebuilt. A total over-kill waste of time, but 99.999% effected

Any of those options will 'eventually' solve the current problem, but only until you get another virus/worm/spyware/malware. There's only one permanent fix, which is.......

6. Install linux. Yeah, it can be a pain to learn, and you'll have to find different programs to do the same stuff, and only 70% of new video games will run, but you'll never have these problems again.

sounds like malware, getting more common unfortunately, and incredibly frustrating. sometimes easy to get off, sometimes now. I recommend installing malwarebytes. google it, installs and goes after malware.

Red

I had this fairly recently and it was a malicious virus or some such called a rootkit.None of my freeware spyware and virus scanners could find it.My brother-in-law is my computer guy and he used malwarebytes to tell what it was but it wouldn't remove it.He planned to format my hard drive and when he tried to save some of my files on a thumb drive,it infected that too.He finally wiped the hard drive clean,and that got rid of it,but I lost a lot of good stuff.

Now I use a virus/spyware software called Vipre.Had to pay $50 for a year,but you get a home license which allows you to use it on all computers in your home(or relatives?).

Edit: I was using IE at the time----Now I use firefox.

Originally Posted by Big Red

sounds like malware, getting more common unfortunately, and incredibly frustrating. sometimes easy to get off, sometimes now. I recommend installing malwarebytes. google it, installs and goes after malware.

Red

+1. malwarebytes is one of the best malware-busters out there.

Bart.

I had something like that happen when I ran some free spyware removal tool on a client's computer. The spyware removal tool was actually spyware. I used a bunch of utilities to remove the program. I found the install files for the program and deleted them manually. I then used a registry cleaner to remove whatever remnants were left. Sometimes you can restore to a previous restore point. That will remove all programs that were installed after the restore point.

Damn! I had that exact thing pop up last week. After I figured out that it was seemingly a Java Applet and I ran McAfee (and it found nothing!) I just let it sit and waited to see what it might do. Ultimately, left on it's own it popped up 4 windows (touting that sale) and sat there. At one point I restarted it and kept it disconnected from the internet and the web page still appeared! That was the key that it was a Java thing. Since this was a work laptop that has heavy encryption, and - I'd recently had a HD crash so everything was newly installed anyway there was no damage it could do really - but I'm not sure I'd let it sit like that without first running a virus detection program.

Long story short, McAfee found nothing, I ultimately shut it down and used another computer until I could get back into town, and 3 days later when the tech guys came to see it, it was all gone! No sign of it since. No clue really as to what is was, but the consensus is that that company popped the Applet on it, programmed it to annoy the user for a day or two, and goes away naturally after a day or two.

The key for me would be to immediately run a virus detection program in case it's something more destructive and just a temporary annoyance.

I'm not sure if this is the same thing I've seen, but it might be basically popup ads which hijack your browser. The ones I've seen are annoying for sure. The pop ups would tell me my Windows system has x number of viruses detected (I use a Mac) and when I'd try to hit cancel it would send me to a page where I could buy 'anti-virus' software. The website wouldn't have any legitimate contact information - just a link for buying their software. Usually I could just close the page and resume my browsing.

I ended up installing anti-ad software, deleting all of my cookies and being more mindful of the sites I browse and I haven't seen one of these popups for quite sometime.

This sounds like the Conficker worm to me. Here is a link to Wikipedia about it. There is also a paragraph about how to remove it. Hope this helps.