bloody virus!

[watters]

in the bottom right hand side of my screen where the clock is etc i have 'virus alert!' written there, when i press start it seems that i cant access any thing like,my documents,accessories etc etc as they have all dissapeared

the 'virus alert' is nothing to do with any of the security feature on my comp and i cant click on it or get rid of it.
anybody seen this before or know how to get rid of it?

[Johnnyb]

just doing a bit of Googling and it sounds like you have a little problem called ''smitfraud'' it is not really a virus but stops system processes, the guy posts the same problem and response four seems to confirm it as smitfraud, page is here :

http://www.computing.net/answers/securi ... 18423.html

there is a fix for it here but never tried it and i assume it is free

http://www.smitfraud-removal.com.remova ... fraud.html

but there can be some complications if not done correctly it says in the text. Good Luck with that one m8 and get a better antivirus programme...........

[watters]

cheers johnny,ive tried downloading the fix for it,its free to scan it but have to pay to sign up to it to have the problems fixed! dont want to pay for it unless i definately know its going to get rid of it!

[Johnnyb]

download it and scan just to confirm it is the problem, i'll go look for some fixes again

[Johnnyb]

Well there is this one, it seems to be free:

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=74265

I also found this write up about it:

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to erase SmitFraud malware. This family is one of the most virulent, copying itself hundreds of times and attaching bugs to your start-up and registry files. Because it is associated with the computer booting up, and attaches itself and its copies to your RAM, SmitFraud malware doesn’t show up in regular virus scans. Really the best way to rid yourself of SmitFraud is to avoid being infected with it in the first place.

If your computer has been infected, and you aren’t a fairly savvy user, it’s best to take it in to a professional so they can clean out the infected RAM and registry files. If you do know what you’re doing, you can boot your computer into Linux (a free operating system available online) or DOS. From there, you will be able to see the infected files and remove SmitFraud by hand.

Not good news, possibly easier to save your pics, favourites,music etc and e-mails and do a format and reinstall windows, only takes an hour or so if you have the windows disc or a recovery disc if its one of the big shop PC's.

Hope this helps m8

[Johnnyb]

Or another option would be to download the Panda antivrus programme from here:

http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/downloads/

Its a free trial for 30 days and is the one i use, it lists 8 different types of smitfraud in the virus library, smitfraud a,b,c and so on and it should shift it, just uninstall it after the removal has been succesfull

[Dave]

Deer o' dear. If you think you have a virus I would recommend unplugging your internet cable, then reboot the PC and start it in safe mode (with networking).

Many spywares look through your registry and upload it to the virus creator, if you leave it like it for long enough then it can start to send more and more stuff like cookies and IE temp files, which basically means that they can force the cookies to their computer and use your passwords.

If you haven't got a decent virus program, I would recommend getting one, you can download quite a few fairly easy or you could use AVG which is free.

[watters]

well after lots of frustration and a few beers later i managed to search through many site and came across a programme which cleaned my comp up and got rid of the nasties and its like new again,heres the link if anybody ever has the problem

http://siri.urz.free.fr/Fix/SmitfraudFix.exe

many thanks to everyone who has tried to help me with this

[bambam]

seeing as u computer geeks r on ere..........

i have a prob with mine when i try to do a windows update.
once i do the update i try to connect to the internet and it wont let me.
using the help disk with talktalk it says i should refresh my ip which i do then it still doesnt work.
then it digs a bit further and it says i need to reconfigure my tcp stack which it says it can do.
this then reboots and i still cant logon to the net.
the only way i seem to be able to get back on the net is to do a system restore from a couple of days ago.
i know the easiest thing to do is not do an update but i want to know why it bug#ers up my pc.


as an extra thing i have had a few blue screens in the last few weeks.

[Johnnyb]

when it updates, is it service pack 3, as quite a few people are having problems with service pack 3 at the moment looking at the various forums, somethign is disagreeing with your setup, i would just leave it anothe few weeks m8, till the new kit arrives

[bambam]

yep it's sp3
as i said i have had a few blue screens recently since sp3 went on.before that i hadn't had any for a couple of years since i sorted the faulty memory stick.

ps i got the sound card and case and vista through so should have the rest by next month.
still thinking about going for a raptor harddrive seeing as it will be a new setup.

[Johnnyb]

Go for it 10,000rpm, 16mb cache and transfer rates of 1.5 gb's per second. you will be in game before anyone except me because i got one too