How do you know which spyware you have?

I posted under user scifinut (husband's ID) once before about 1-1/2 months ago trying to work through all of your instructions in the 'READ ME FIRST' post, and have a question about #4 under Cleaning and Scanning.

There is a note stating what programs to run based on what spyware you have.

But, how do I know what spyware I have? Anything that the programs deleted didn't clue me in on what I may have had, and am wondering whether I need to run additional programs. I once saw "About:Blank" flash at the bottom of my screen (I believe when closing out IE), but don't know if that means I have it or not.

I was trying to find a thread on this, but wasn't having much luck, so thought I would post this so I know where to go from here. I performed the instructions up to this #4, but did not go further since I wasn't sure what I had.

Thanks so much!

 

Thanks for the help. One other question for now...is there a problem with the About Buster program? I just tried to do an update on it and I got an error message:

Run-time error '5'

Invalid procedure call or argument

Thanks! I'm sure I'll be posting shortly with questions/issues on the desktop we are now trying to clean up.

 

This download should fix that error message:
http://www.javacoolsoftware.net/downloads/missingfilesetup.exe

 

Okay, I tried the last couple of suggestions, but still couldn't get About Buster to update, so I did not bother to run it after extracting it again, since I figured it wouldn't be up to date anyway.

I have now gone through all of the new 'READ ME FIRST' instructions up through #6 and then the instructions on how to protect PC from malware. I am not sure what all info. to include in this post, but Bitdefender found:

Trojan.Downloader.IstBar.ES
Adware.Wheaterbug.A

There were some files noted on the 'detected problems' tab, but not sure what exactly is wrong at this point. It appears as though at least 1 file was not disinfected or deleted. I ran it again in safe mode and it still showed Aware.Wheaterbug.A, which I believe it then deleted.

Panda noted:
spyware/tooncom No disinfected
Adware/CWS No disinfected

Trend Micro didn't give me a report, but showed 2 file names (long paths):
wbk40.tmp
HTML SUNFRAUD.B

Since Spyware Doctor ended up finding 192 files, I ended up purchasing this so I could delete them.

Spybot always and still does find 2 items each time I run it: (this is not typed exactly, but is close)
Windows Security Center Virus scan disable
Windows Security Center Firewall disable

and every time I load my PC, it shuts off parts of McAfee (always the virus scan and usually privacy service) Any idea why this may be happening? I get an error message stating some component is missing and I need to reinstall, but when I tried this a couple weeks ago, it did not solve the problem. Maybe I will try once more now that I have worked on spyware issues.

So, basically the online scanners found a bunch of things, but the other programs downloaded only found the 2 items mentioned above with Spybot.

Since starting this spyware troubleshooting, I started getting some virtual low memory error messages, but everything is still working. (not sure if spyware related??)

Issues I have had a long time and still have:

PC having a delay during startup while icons are loading; seems to just freeze and do nothing for about 30 seconds and then continues on okay.

Also, when I do searches in windows, Windows Installer always starts up and then tries to configure MS Office 2000, which I have to cancel 4 times before it goes away.

Spybot keeps finding the 2 items mentioned above whenever I scan.

Issues that appears to be resolved:

No longer redirected in a website I use almost every day. I always had to log in 2x to get where I needed to be.

I can write to my CD-ROM again, though this was corrected BEFORE starting the procedures you have provided. It seemed to correct itself somehow, but I believe it was spyware related also. (I had only been running Ad-aware SE and Spybot, and eventually MS Anitspyware in normal mode before.)

Guess, I'm not sure where to go from here or if there may still be some spyware issues.

Also, am wondering which programs need to be run going forward and how often? Do they always need to be done in safe mode?

I also noticed when I downloaded Firefox today, it was not the Beta 1 version I originally downloaded on my laptop about a month or so ago. Should I change the version on my laptop? I know my laptop does not allow me to upload in Firefox; have to use IE.

Also, I am working on a Dell XPS T700r
748 mHz
128 RAM
Windows XP SP2

Thanks so much!

 

Thanks for all the responses. I am trying to make the changes under advanced settings for Hijack This, but don't seeing these settings after I click on Open the Misc Tools section.

I must be missing something?

 

Thanks for such a quick response on both issues!

I must be blind; I'm not seeing this option there. It has a section to click 'Scan' under Scan & fix stuff, but nothing else. ??

 

Nevermind! I am blind; did not even notice the scroll bar..SORRY!! Been at this too long this weekend I think...

 

Okay, here is the log...

Thanks again!

 

Okay, I will try this and let you know if it works.

I did install GuruNet, but I don't recall what Atomica is. Doesn't sound familiar.

 

Okay, directions for the link you provided were getting confusing, so I decided to first double check Add/Remove programs as they suggested and still found:
Norton Firewall
Symantec LiveReg
Symantec LiveUpdate

so I removed all of these.

Then, I unchecked the box for the 'Symantec Network Drivers Service' in msconfig.

When I went into services.msc it showed this as disabled (was manual before).

Next, I reran HiJack This to see if the entry you mentioned was still there, and now it is gone.

Should I still run other steps in your link, or is this enough to resolve the issue?

Also, still having issues with McAfee shutting itself off after startup. Should I uninstall and reinstall again? Don't understand why this is occuring.

Thanks so much! You've been a HUGE help!