[lynn P.]

All of a sudden on my tool bar, there's this 'virus protection' thing popping up saying "there's a virus threatening to take my credit card number and it asks me if I want to register the virus protection". I say no, but it keeps popping up and pestering me. I have a good virus protection on this computer but I know they aren't 100%. I'm scanning it right now with the system I have, but this invader keeps popping up. I'm worried and don't know how to get it off my tool bar and how to stop it from popping up. It keeps says a threatening virus is getting in. Any ideas?

[fadedspirit]

If you have internet explorer, look for a bar that has File,Edit, View,Favorites, Tools, and help. If you don't see it, right click on any gray part under your address bar and click on menu bar. Click on View and
go to toolbars. uncheck the tool bar that keeps giving you problems.
Next, go to google and download spybot search and destroy. Here's the link: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html.

Once installed, install it and follow the onscreen directions. If you need more help, you can pm me and I can help you further.

You may have picked up a piece of malware somewhere. malwarebytes anti-malware is a free product that will scan your hard drive and get rid of things like that, if your current virus software is not up to the task. You might need to start your computer in 'safe mode with networking' before trying to download it. (Press f8 while the computer first boots up and choose that from the list you are offered) It is the malware itself that is popping up the message you are sseing, so don't do anything it wants you to do!

[lynn P.]

Thank you Ripley and fadedspirit for trying to help. I tried to solve this on my own but was afraid I couldn't get rid of it. I took it to a computer specialist I know and he's working on it. For now I'm using my daughters computer. This virus was so bad - it embedded itself in my toolbar, saying there's a virus and I need to buy a program from them. It kept popping up and I would have to reject it, to get it off the screen. Then it would pop up every 10 seconds. It would also suddenly shut off the laptop and yesterday it sent old emails out of my 'sent folder' and re-sent them to people - embarassing.

I had virus protection but I know they're not always 100%. If this ever happens again should I immediately stop the computer? Where do they come from and who sends them? This is so maddening.

[Perna]

It does sound like malware. Malware isn't a virus and usually won't be found by a virus checker. Make sure your computer guy gives you something to scan for malware every now and then so you can get obnoxious things like that off your computer.

[lynn P.]

Thanks Perna - what is Malware if it's not a virus and where does it come from?

[Perna]

Viruses are an attack on your computer and change things in your computer and can make it so your computer can be used/controlled by others. Malware is just what it sounds like and what you experienced, people trying to get to "you" personally. They want you to buy their product or trick you into giving them your information, etc. Viruses just take it, you don't know they're there and they are more embedded in your machine, not just a single piece of software.

Malware usually comes from surfing the Internet, going to certain sites or investigating what looks like a legitimate ad or downloading "free" stuff. It is similar to some viruses that way but since it isn't trying to get into your computer innards through ports and down deep stuff, the virus protector doesn't "see" it. It's stuff that you "willingly" click on and "ask" for. It can be as nasty as virusware but can't go to someone else's computer, doesn't look at your files, just embeds itself in a single program usually. Often if you uninstall that program and reinstall it, that gets rid of the problem. But there's other not obvious malware (people tracking where you're going on the internet and what you're looking at so they can better see how people behave on the internet but, unlike some people/sites that ask your permission to do this, malware does not ask, just does it and you don't know either what they are studying the data for or how it impacts you).

The really ugly malware that asks for or gets information from "you" (rather than taking control of your machine) is known as "phishing" and I'm sure you've gotten junk mail telling you you've won something or that your bank account has quit working, click on this link and we'll fix it? That's trying to get YOU to "willingly" click on the link (like writing stuff in contracts in small print) and give them information so they can steal from you. "Mal" stands for "malice". It's ugly and wants to hurt YOU rather than your machine. It's also called spyware (spying on you and what you're doing).

Viruses send themselves to everyone in your email account, for example. My niece's daughter had a problem with that on Facebook, someone got in her account and her account started sending out pornographic links saying they were from her with things like "Look at this!" for the subject and, since she's a young girl, friend/relative people would click on it and it would come to their machine and then send out the same links from their email accounts. Mostly, viruses are used to "control" your machine in the middle of the night, say, when you don't realize it. That's why you should turn off your machine when you're not using it. If someone has a virus they control on your machine they can send things through your machine that makes it look like it is coming from your machine. That's how spam works and why email accounts, no matter how good, can't get rid of all spam. It's untraceable because it's going through so many other machines you can't find out where it started, who's doing it.

Some "obvious"/big viruses can be stopped by virus software but bad guys are constantly thinking up new bad viruses and the protection people have to get "caught" by a new virus before they can protect against it. That's what's behind all the "crashes" you hear about and the credit card thefts, etc. There's hackers trying to get at the machines and what they contain. Some efforts are more serious than others, none of them are any good.

[lynn P.]

I was surprised that it sent an old email back to someone - because I got strange replies back from the contact. Have you heard of that happening before? Last year on my daughters MSN, it would send porn. links when talked and pressed send. It's so scary and annoying. Thanks for all the information ((Perna))

We used to have a lot of problems with malware because my kids would go onto gaming sites and download games and stuff. The malware came with it as an added bonus. It can get really bad, sometimes requiring a hard reboot of your system. (That's what happened to us.) Since then, we absolutely forbid our kids to download anything off the internet. We only use trusted websites. And wallah! No more malware.

[lynn P.]

I wonder can you get it from down copying pictures from google or from getting songs off limewire? Thanks for the info. farmergirl.

[AShadow721]

That sounds like Malware. I had things like that pop up on my laptop before when I was in school and it would forbid me to go to my school website, because it posed a treat to my computer. Then it wouldn't let me go to any site and I wasn't allowed to delete it on my own, because of the way it's creators made it. Those things are soooo frustrating. Somehow, I was able to download a Malware remover off the internet and have it at least disabled so that I could use my computer. I don't think I ever actually got rid of it though.

[lynn P.]

That's what I was afraid of AShadow - I got it off my toolbar but when I checked in depth I could see it listed there. Then when I realized it resent an email from 2 weeks ago I knew I was in trouble - so I took it to a guy we always deal with to help us. I should get it back tomorrow. If we get Malware protection can my daughter still use Limewire or should we avoid it and does downloading pictures from google make you vulnerable too??

I saw on Good Morning America - they said one big threat right now is the internet threat/war between countries. There's the technology available where an enemy could hack into lets say the airline or banking systems and shut things down.

[trance]

hey guys check this site out...https://www.grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2...this is a very good site for checking to see if you are open to attacks...

Hey lynn...you have to understand the nature of limewire and other peer to peer sites...they are sharing sites which mean that the files you download are actually on someone else's computer...so if you have sharing turned on then you too are sharing files that are on your computer with others on the net...google limewire and find a how to turn off file sharing tutorial...scan each download with antivirus before opening the file...you can still use limewire with malware apps or antivirus but they may treat it as a virus or spyware I'm not sure so google your questions and read read read...lol...I hope this helps...

join a site like... http://majorgeeks.com/
they can help you with computer related viruses and stuff...to join is free so have at it...the most important thing to remember is to stay alert...

downloading anything from the net can be dangerous just remember to scan everything with antivirus before opening...what I do is have everything downloaded to a folder on my desktop then I scan it everytime I download something...

Hey lynn,

it is possible to get rid of malware completely. I use several different programs in addition to my regular antivirus. I have used Malwarebytes antimalware on three peoples' computers to get rid of exactly what your computer got. There is a free version that is fully functional, but if you want to be able to set a schedule for it to automatically check things once a day/week/month, you need the paid version. I also use Spyhunter. That you can use to scan for free, but will need a paid version to remove things (annoying!) If you are running windows, there is also a microsoft malware thingie you can download, called windows malicious software removal tool I used to be a bit lax about such things, but having seen other computers completely locked up, and since my computer is one of the ways I earn my livelihood, I now err on the side of extreme caution.
As for where it comes from, yes, torrent sites and other popular download places are rife with this stuff. I avoid such things like the plague they are, but the tools above also run in the background and do their best to detect such things in realtime as they try to start messing things up.
Sorry you got this bug, it is very nasty indeed!

[lynn P.]

Thank you Trance and Ripley for your helpful advice.

Any time