beware of new online game trojan horses

[Wylonus]

sorry if this is not right place to post, but it related to hardware topic or i am wrong, and would like to be informed and how to repair.

i just installed new updated AVG, and it found trojan versions, Trojan Horse PSW OnlineGames variations, couldnt believe how many they exist, my older scanner failed to check and they are too slow to get updates.

what it mean, it recorded and report keystroke of passwords.

reason i installed, i just noticed odd blink of toolbar vanished for few seconds, and reset my icons on window and i couldnt "right-click" to open anything except forcing to hit start and restart, it repeated in every 2 hours time frame and toolbar lockups occurred.
sometimes, i disconnected and let it sit idle, and it turn on by it self to reconnect while i was playing cards or playing PC games (total wars or civ 4) almost every 2 hours. i knew i didnt turn on or let it run.
i played Total Wars for 3 years and Neverwinter Nights 1 & 2 for years.

i never seen this behavior of toolbar blinks since i got online services on 1999, this happen around 3-4 weeks ago.
does this look familiar to anyone and knows what to do?

rebooting every 2 hours get really old and i refused to pay Geeksquad to reformat, they are not professional and all they got was 2 weeks training just to do band-aid cheap fixes.
they dont know how to fix virus or bunch of programs to use.
they cost me my previous computer, damaged beyond repair and manufacturer had to replace hardwares.

it was too late and noticed far too late to catch it so i could had set back to system recovery to last working date, if i set back to older date and can of worms might have been open.

i am open to suggestion and need help to fix, if i had no choice to reformat, but those will be there waiting to be browse-by download if those security failed to blocks and not updated for new threats.

[Shian]

If you have a virus that bad, you should wipe and reformat your harddrive now instead of trying to fix it.

And I highly reccommend getting AGV off your system and getting a new anti virus. I installed a military edition of Norton and it caught several things that AGV didn't. I also switched when I read this:

If you commonly use stuff like Google, Amazon, Ebay, Yahoo or other rapidly updated backends, you might have found yourself facing false accusations that you're a bot recently. And this may have lead you to fully AV your machine and find nothing and yet still get these messages.

This could be why

If you're getting these messages and are running AVG, my best advice is to ditch it and get NOD-32 as quickly as possible. Yes, you have to pay for it. Yes, you'll be glad you did.

This has been a public service announcement on your behalf and the behalf of those webhosts who are now being battered on bandwidth everywhere.

Thank you.

[Kumu Honua]

Comodo has a beta AV. I used it for quite a while since I use their Firewall. It did what it's supposed to do. Only problem I had was it's autoupdate caused 100% CPU requiring a program termination to get back to normal.

It's free.

Best option is a healthy dose of paranoia.

[Carsia Wolfsong]

I use AVG Ainti Virus Program and I haven't had any problems just yet... Been using this Virus program for going on 3 to 4 years now. Unless they did something wrong by an employee that works off of this Program and using Online access, The only thing I could think of is them by using an actual Virus to scam the program itself for FREE users to use it off of.. I haven't Trusted Nortan sence I bought the CD itself.. Its no better if AVG is infected because half their Disks has a hidden Virus program that completly destroys your hard Drive. SOME, I'm saying.. THere are others that have no problem with Nortan. I am just one that will not return back to it with my experiance. I've gotta three combo that I use for runnning my computer for Firewall protection and its worked for along time now. So I don't know what else to say.. Exept giving my oppinion is all. As Shian says, Reformate your computer instead of fixing it.. Get some Disks to TRY and back up some files you want to keep safe.. And then erase your Hard Drive and reinstall Windows XP ( Vista if you have it ) onto your computer, but before you go online.. Find a good Virus Program that will work well with your computer...IT all depends on you

[Barrak]

I've used AVG for over 2 years, including upgrading to the 8.0 Free version a month or so ago. I get a few false positives sometimes (in files that I have created myself and I know are safe), but other than that it's worked well.

It also seems to use far less system resources during a scan than the older versions did, which is a great improvement

[GalemThawn]

Once a trojan, virus, malware, or any other such thing has integrated itself into your OS and altered the OS, you should backup, format, and reinstall. You're going to save yourself a LOT of work and headache.

From professional experience, I've had clients that wanted me to save their current installation at all costs. I've spent 30 hours attempting to repair Windows XP, and in the end we still formatted.

[Fratricide]

I agree with Galem... I spent quite a bit of time trying to fix computers infected as well.

My first suggestion is always if you are infected, reformat
1) Save a copy of all your important stuff, which you should be doing already.
2) Disconnect from the internet, Yes.. actually remove the network cable from the computer.
3) Make sure you have all the drivers you need for your computer available as well as an antivirus/firewall program.
4) Reformat, and if you have a particularly heinous virus, don't do the quick format (yes I know reformatting 1TB takes a long time)
5) Reinstall your OS from disk, and install the Antivirus/firewall.
6) Install your drivers.
7) Plug in your network cable.
8) Get OS updates.
9) Install Istaria... and play away.

Doing this should only take ~4 hours (depending on your computer/network speed), vs the 30+ hours you will waste trying to clean off the more hostile virus' in which you usually end up wiping the drive in the long run anyway.

If you don't run a virus scanner on your computer at all (which is definately not recommended anymore) Use Linux... Wait.. folks are making virus' for that now too..

[Zexoin]

Use Linux... Wait.. folks are making virus' for that now too..

... Really ?? O_o

[lightning claw]

If you have a virus that bad, you should wipe and reformat your harddrive now instead of trying to fix it.

And I highly recommend getting AGV off your system and getting a new anti virus. I installed a military edition of Norton and it caught several things that AGV didn't. I also switched when I read this:

I agree with your first statement Shian how-ever, to date avg is Vastly superior to Any of nortan's Crap its NOTHING BUT BLOAT WHERE now i see avg one day becoming crap on a stick potency but its not this version this one scans the results of googel yahoo and other browsers and alerts you not to click on any thing thats not a green check mark

Some Online games scan your computer be for you log in to there system this is called Hack sheald i know Rappuzel uses it with great success this will stop exploits in the game as well (we once had a issue with that )

i use Avg 8.0 its kept my compie relitivly safe avg picks up stuff that nortan misses and vice versa but for performance i am still looking for a program that can beat avg and nortan aint it .

[Shian]

NOD-32 then not norton.

I'm a little bitter cause AGV has cost me two HDs to date. How do you know your antivirus is working until it's too late?

[lightning claw]

Probing My Hard drive Periodically for stealths *.* *.vir you know the extensions

[Nisse]

Well, this is not good news. I use AVG free. I have version 8, and promptly disabled the link scanner when I saw exactly how it worked on my first post upgrade google search. Problem is I don't know if there's something else wrong with AVG now, because the icon only has 1 level of alert ¬_¬

I will notify my father (I live in his home currently because I am unable to take care of myself due to disability) about the virus situation. He's been unwilling to use normal anti virus programs in the past because the pay to upgrade after x amount of days irks him...

I'm not a fan of the bloatware the newer anti viral programs have become. I just want a watchdog on my system and a daily scan.
I think I will be building a pc from scratch sometime around the end of the year, and will be buying my own software and so on then but until then, I'm keeping vigilant. (nothing sharper than a dragoness' eye on her hoard, eh? )

Speaking of daily scans and AVG, is it normal for AVG to go for ~7h for a 75 gig drive? o_0

[Takora Drakan]

I use myself Avira Antivir , its free and a very good anti virus programm in my opinion, since I have it I didnt get anymore a virus.

[Zexoin]

I'm using Avast! myself

[Kumu Honua]

No! Comodo!

[Nidhoggr]

7 hours for 75G dang... Takes me about 41 mins for ~650GB (500GB Raid1 + 150GB) with AVG Free 8.0

[Nisse]

Hmm. Could it be the hardware in my machine? It's only got 512 ram and a pentium 4.

[Wylonus]

i am back now, i just reformated.

i went thru plenty of scanning wares, some do take forever and it is not desirable to have scanning for 2 to 5 hrs before able to run smoothly, scannings lag most games.
so i just put most of fav list i used just blacklisted to avoid browsing again.
even some spywares are "rouge" like Xoftspy, it wasnt recommended by many, some other "official" legit wares got rewrite with hidden virus as piggyback loader. that nasty.

it seem that, each person got thier own preferances and what program they like, may work for some and may not work well for other folks, or depending on local regional "homemade" webtrackers.
Microsoft windows and Yahoo, Google, Firefox should have something to fix most hated Ad-yieldmanager.com, or ban that unwanted software, it keep coming back, no matter how skillfull with computer. that thier job to check thier website if get infected or make updated safe browser.

it just pointless to get all kinds of legit spy guards and take up hard drive space and defraging all that clutters, and countless scannings.
i personally feel those hackers or virus writers should be on death row instead of short 5 year prison term or depend on severity of damages, it mean nothing to them, they should be afraid when knowing they get caught and keys thrown away.
unless some crackers working for some companies in question want you to buy thier products by making "bait by free download" by buying if you need to remove unwanted wares they created to infected in first place, and would expose our CC# accounts.
laws dont effect other country or varied local international laws.
some may have been used by "mafia" cells, but nobody can prove it and it is traceless and hard to find with series of zombie computers.
it is sad and i know it is frustration and hard to keep computer healthy.

it just simple, make a list to avoid visiting those sites, (music, Emulators, e-mails, and other questionable sites that deal with pharmacies, casinos, and "adult" date services) are loaded and hidden with browse by downloaders.
then reformat and try stay that way and if you want to browse questionable site, make sure you use older or expendable junk computer instead of using your main computer.
no account or e-mail should not be in your old model's HD memory file.

not sure what good spybot to use, use older computer to test it before you may harm your main when installing any new versions.
i wish i had 2 computers, one for restricted for games and limit trusted sites only and old one for browsing.

it was easier to reformat and done by 3-4 hrs instead of registry searching and remove them for +30 hours of lost time.

now i am back playing again.

[Fratricide]

Use Linux... Wait.. folks are making virus' for that now too..

... Really ?? O_o

Aye.. that it is true, otherwise folks wouldn't be making antivirus for them as well.. Symantec makes an antivirus program for linux/unix as well as the Apple OS as well.