Techie Help Please - Unwanted Additional Antivirus Protection

[Diego_Sideburns]

I have Norton Antivirus installed on my laptop but I keep getting a box appearing on the screeen, which prevents me from typing until I click to remove it, trying to get me to register for XP Antivirus 2008. It warns me about how many infections it has found, but I'm quite happy with the scans carried out by my Norton. The wording on the screen box is "Unwanted software (malware) or tracking cookies have been found during last scan. It is highly recommended to remove it from your computer". On the bootom bar a box appears Saying your computer is at risk, xx (No.) errors have been found. These boxes appear every few minutes and are driving me mad, as I have to click constantly to remove them!

 

A large box also appears too frequently listing the results of the XP Antivirus scan. It invites registration to remove the results of the scan. Registration involves a one-off payment in $ with all credit card details sent to a US site. Obviously I'm not going to fall for that one.

 

The colour scheme of the various boxes are very similar to Windows XP and it looks to me as though it is purporting to be a Microsoft product. As I say I'm happy that the scans carried out by my Norton antivirus are adequate protection.

 

Does anyone know how I can prevent these boxes from appearing on the screen?

[Ackey]

Sounds like either one of two things :

 

1. A genuine XP scan is finding Spyware (not a virus, but not good!) and Norton isn't finding these. In which case (not being able to check how genuine the pop up is) I'd suggest you screen shot it and send it to Microsoft (assuming you have a legal version of XP) and make them aware, they will be able to tell you if it's a genuine M$ message are not.

 

2. If the message is Spyware in itself, which Norton may not be configured to detect, this can be of concern, as like a virus Spyware can create security breaches on your machine and pass sensitive data to 3rd parties.

 

Advice

 

1. Email the image to M$ asking them if this is an authentic message.

 

2. Download, install and run this >Adaware 2007< which is a free anti-spyware application which will remove cookies and various other forms of malware some anti-virus applications will fail to detect.

 

For 2, follow the advice given by the application itself to install it, and then run the default setting scan. It will ask if you are sure you want to delete X, Y and Z. Without being able to see which files it asks about I am not willing to 100% guarantee it will work perfectly, however in the 3-4 years I've been using it I've only ever used the default scan and it's never caused any problems, and always found the dangerous files for me.

 

 

The above may not stop the pop up immedietly... like I say without seeing it I'd suggest you email it to Microsoft.

 

Anything else, post in the thread and I'll help as best I can mate.

[tactically_naive]

Or bin Norton and install AVG. It's free, perfectly able, RAM-friendly and unintrusive.

[chickers]

Or bin Norton and install AVG. It's free, perfectly able, RAM-friendly and unintrusive.

or just dont use any and dont go on any porn sites

[Diego_Sideburns]

 

Thanks for the advice. I'll email the image to Microsoft - how do I screen shot it?

[Guest oa_exile]

how do I screen shot it?

1. Press the Print Screen key on your keyboard. It may be labeled [PrtScn].
2. Open an image editing program, such as Microsoft Paint.
3. Go to the Edit menu and choose Paste.If prompted to enlarge the image, choose Yes.
4. Optional: Use your image editor's crop tool to crop out unnecessary portions of the screen shot.
5. Go to the File Menu and choose Save As.
6. Navigate to the folder where you want to save the image.
7. Type a file name for the image.
8. Select a file type.
9. Click the Save button

[Matt]

It's not authentic, its malware.

 

It'll probably take some removing, they're usually dug in like a sheep tick. I'll need to see a hijackthis log Terry.

[Ackey]

It's not authentic, its malware.

 

It'll probably take some removing, they're usually dug in like a sheep tick. I'll need to see a hijackthis log Terry.

I'll admit that's the way I was leaning... but how'd you know? Genuine question, not being pedantic.

[Matt]

Experience. From what D_S has said, XP Antivirus 2008 is hijacking his browser for nothing more than an advert. It states that he's riddled with infections, when in fact it probably isn't. If D_S has been using Norton - and doing regular scans, he'll be okay.

 

Plus a simple Google search of the infamous XP Antivirus 2008 gives me enough evidence to support my claim.

. He needs to bolster his defence with a decent firewall. I recommend Zonealarm, however new updates to ZA have caused some users problems - I use an old version of ZA which is spot on. There are many feebies out there, I will help him if he needs one.

[Ackey]

Experience. From what D_S has said, XP Antivirus 2008 is hijacking his browser for nothing more than an advert.

Ahh... way I read it was that they were popping up in Windows (bottom right hand corner jobby) and not Explorer... and I know M$ stuff does that, as it took me about an hour to work out how to stop it doing it in Vista on the 'inlaws' new laptop!

 

I have trusty 2000 running on my PC. It doesn't do anything (some might say full stop) without you asking it too so I wasn't sure if Vista followed XP's lead.

[oafc_ok]

I have Norton Antivirus installed on my laptop but I keep getting a box appearing on the screeen, which prevents me from typing until I click to remove it, trying to get me to register for XP Antivirus 2008. It warns me about how many infections it has found, but I'm quite happy with the scans carried out by my Norton. The wording on the screen box is "Unwanted software (malware) or tracking cookies have been found during last scan. It is highly recommended to remove it from your computer". On the bootom bar a box appears Saying your computer is at risk, xx (No.) errors have been found. These boxes appear every few minutes and are driving me mad, as I have to click constantly to remove them!

 

A large box also appears too frequently listing the results of the XP Antivirus scan. It invites registration to remove the results of the scan. Registration involves a one-off payment in $ with all credit card details sent to a US site. Obviously I'm not going to fall for that one.

 

The colour scheme of the various boxes are very similar to Windows XP and it looks to me as though it is purporting to be a Microsoft product. As I say I'm happy that the scans carried out by my Norton antivirus are adequate protection.

 

Does anyone know how I can prevent these boxes from appearing on the screen?

 

Have you tried turning your computer off then turning it back on again?

Edited February 24, 2008 by oafc_ok