This is driving me nuts - someone please help

minghawk · 8th April 2004

Asa new member on this forum, I have searched previous threads, but cannot find anything that quite matches the problems that I am currently experiencing.

Apologies if I've missed anything

I have Win XP Home SP1
Amongst other things I have Norton AV 2003 (up-to-date definitions) and Spybot S&D

A couple of days ago, i relaxed my cookie settings 9big mistake).

My explorer homepage has now been hijacked
(http://search-town.net/), and when I use the contact us link, they suggest that I download an exe removal tool - which there's no way I'm downloading an exe from those f*ckers).

On top of that, Spybot flags a problem with a registry entry & file called Winlogon.exe, but it is unable to fix the problem.

i have tried deleting the regisrty entry, but no good.
I have tried going back to a restore point, but each restore fails!

Not sure if this is related, but when I try to shut down the PC, it just hangs on the blue 'windows is shutting down' page & I have to turn off power at the mains.

on top of all this, Norton flags a security alert each time i start the PC up - a trojan horse on explorer.exe !!, but when I do a full scan - no problems found

what is going on with my system - any ideas or advice?
sorry for the lengthy post, but there's so much stuff going screwy i just had to list it all!

TIA

Ming

**charlesvar** · 8th April 2004

Hello Ming,

You relaxed more than your cookie settings. Don't get trojans from cookies. Read this article on Browser security http://www.infinisource.com/techfiles/surf-safe.html

Steps to take:

Download HijackThis

http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/htlogtutorial.html Tutorial by author and paste the log so that one of the experts can take a look at it - Lonny and others

Do a on-line virus/trojan checker
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/

* they suggest that I download an exe removal tool - which there's no way I'm downloading an exe from those f*ckers).*

Your feelings are undratandable, but that may be the best way to get rid of the immediate symptoms, then use the tools above to clean it up.

In the meantime, I'm assuming that the Mods will move this thread to the Virus/Security Board.

Regards - Charles

**PeteC** · 9th April 2004

minghawk - Welcome to the Board

You have come to the right place

, but your problem is best dealt with in the Security/Virus/Spyware forum and I am moving it there.

When posting a thread please use a meaningful subject - this will not only draw attention to your problem, but will be of help to others who search the Board in the future

Posting Rules # 3

**markp62** · 9th April 2004

In addition to Housecall, give the online Trojan scan a go. The link is below.

minghawk · 11th April 2004

thanks for all the help guys -

will name future threads in a more obvious manner - sorry.

Not sure quite how my pc got infected - i have the norton av and firewall always running, and always updated.

found i had various blaster & welchia viruses (virii?),
all clean,

thanks again

ming

**markp62** · 11th April 2004

Quote:

found i had various blaster

You need to go to windows update, and install all the critical updates. This blaster bypasses Norton.
http://v4.windowsupdate.microsoft.com/en/default.asp