Just when I thought that I was one of the most “web savvy” and “tech savvy” people on earth, who could never be tricked into downloading anything that would infect my computer…
BAM!
My laptop gets infected by what’s come to be known as the “Google Redirection Virus”.
The symptoms are very obvious…
You do a Google (Yahoo or Bing) search, and when you click on any of the results, then it redirects you to a totally unrelated page on a completely unrelated web site that has all kinds of ads on it. My Google toolbar for FireFox even blocked some of the sites as spam/malware sites, and did not allow me to actually visit them.
So I first consoled myself following this rude shock that in spite of having McAfee Virus Protection on my laptop, using only Firefox (no IE) and being extremely “download paranoid”, I had still ended up a victim of this stupid virus.
And then I started my Google search (every time I did a search to research this virus, guess where the first Google result took me? To a spam site, of course! The virus was still very much in action!
The first thing I found, was that the virus had changed the way my Firefox browser connects to the interwebs.
See how the setting had changed to “Manual proxy configuration” to point to “127.0.0.1” on port “64646”.
First thing to do is to change the setting to “No Proxy” and hit “OK” (unless you’re actually using some other proxy server).
That seemed like it solved the redirection issue, but I had to be absolutely certain. So back to Google – without the redirection issue.
And that’s when I found more and more people talking about the Hitman Free Virus Scanner software.
The software itself has a cost associated, but they allow you to do a free scan and even remove any viruses it may find, for free, using their free 30-day trial version.
If you don’t wish to fully install the anti-virus software, just select the option to run a free “one time” scan of your computer.
Worked like a charm!
It picked up on many malware files on my laptop, as you can see below.
Here’s what it looks like after it cleaned up all the garbage (required a reboot to fully delete one file).
So here I am, after cleaning and rebooting – totally virus free (or so I hope!).
Now that I’ve destroyed whatever little confidence you may have had in “big name” anti-virus programs, go read more about the Hitman tool, and get rid of the trojans!
Happy Trojan Hunting! 🙂
– Ravi Jayagopal
PS: Feel free to pass this link on to others. And as always, don’t forget to comment below. Cheers!
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Ravi-
As a fellow web dev and happy DAP user, I must tell u…
Now that you’re a successful Internet Marketer, do what successful Internet Marketers do!
You deserve a computer that can keep up with you… get a Mac! 😀
Sincerely,
Russell
Russel,
Good point. Unfortunately, I’ve already tried that – and failed!
I purchased a fully tricked-out 17″ Macbook Pro last year. Spent an entire day trying to figure out how to get it to do all the things I wanted it to do (and I do a *lot* more than just browsing and watching videos and listening to songs :-).
Just couldn’t figure it all out quickly enough. The learning curve was too steep coming from windoze – especially for all the techie and business tools I’m so used to currently. And I just don’t have even a few hours to try to learn this new stuff – more so when it’s not furthering my business.
So, I decided that a known devil is better than an unknown angel, and gave the expensive laptop to my 11 year old daughter. She’s insanely thrilled to be browsing the web and youtube and doing emails with it!
And I’m very happy to be back to my insanely productive self on the not-perfect-but-totally-productive-for-me windoze laptop 🙂
Tried it, glad to report that it detected no trojans or viruses of any type. Probably because for years I ran ZA sec suite which has good antivirus and reinforced firewall. A few months ago I switched to Avast (free) and Windows firewall. I also scan my PC occasionally with Malwarebytes (free) ‘just in case’.
You may want to also consider running combofix. This is a free utility that checks for all sorts of bad guys.
From running an IT firm for the last seven years I have seen lots of critters that have infected machines, many like the one you describe as well.
Often one removal tool doesn’t get rid of everything. It removes enough to make it not work, but still there are other files remaining.
Definitely run combofix and I would also download and install Malwarebytes scanner and run that as well. They have a free version which works fine.
Hope that helps!!
Ravi,
Thanks for sharing this article. Looks like I am save at the moment but as you know I like to stay on top of things like yourself. Last week I was dealing with “The Blue Screen of Death” (or BSOD) for a few days before learning what program was causing this issue.
No one likes down time… especially when it is caused by a virus.
Warm regards,
James Rivers
Titan Media Marketing
Thanks for the information. I downloaded and found 6 programs that contained malware or viruses on my computer. I have a very good security system and these got by somehow.
Glad you got the issue resolved Ravi..and thanks for the tips on the software. Im glad to see you back in action, I wish you well, and again, glad to see you back.
Ken