Welcome to A Tech's Life. The purpose of this blog is to provide insight to some of the simple and more complicated chores that I encounter during my day as a Computer Technician.

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Friday, August 21, 2009

PersonalAntivirus - Hey thats not my antivirus software!!

In the last 6 months, the most common software issue that I have come across is defiantly PersonalAntivirus. It goes by many names. AV 360, Security Center, AntiVirus Pro 2008, AntiVirus Pro 2009 and so on. So what is it?

Personal Antivirus, or PersonalAntivirus, is a virus that was developed by a company called Innovagest 2000.

Personal Antivirus is installed by a Trojan called Zlob. Zlob will appear in a very convincing pop up window that give false information about virus, Trojan, worm and Spyware injections. Zlob then tries to convince you that it is a legitimate program that can remove all of the alleged infections it claims you have. It tells you to fix, repair or scan your system. What this action does not do any of these actions, it downloads and eventually installs itself. This Personal Antivirus message is used to persuade you into purchasing, downloading and installing their program to remove the imaginary spyware. Unfortunately it does not remove any of these imaginary virus's at all. You have just paid for nothing. This virus can do any and all of the following: turn off you network card stopping Internet access, block safe mode, block task manager, block run command, delete data, freeze the computer, cause annoying pop ups and the list goes on and on.

PersonalAntivirus or PAV attaches itself to "links" on websites. If you get the pop up the best course of action is to power down the computer. When you reboot, it should be gone. But if you have it, that is where the fun begins.

Up until last week (Middle of August 2009) in 99.9% of the time we had to format the Hard Drive, and reload Windows. Which was always a pain, and costly to the customer. But there is light at the end of the tunnel. Enter stage left, "Vipre"

VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware is high-performance security software that doesn't slow down your PC like older, traditional antivirus products. VIPRE is the end of antivirus software as you know it. The press loves it. VIPRE got 5 STARS on download.com. Protect your PC from 'being owned' by bad guys with our free 30-day trial! (with registration)
**http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/home-home-office/vipre/

Vipre has actually blocked PAV from installing, which was a huge victory in this battle. But if you already have it, this is how I remove PAV.

1. Download, Install and Update Vipre.
If you can not download it because PAV has blocked Internet access you will have to download it from another computer and put it on a usb stick. If this is the case also download SuperAntiSpyware at the same time we will need this later.

2. Once it has rebooted the computer finish installing Vipre.

3. Hit the Windows Key and R on the keyboard and type msconfig in the run bar.

4. Navigate to the StartUp tab and click disable all (except Vipre if it is there).

5. Right Click on My Computer and select Properties. Then Select System Restore and check mark the Turn off System Restore. This will make the scan much faster and remove all old restore points, removing the risk of the virus being there.

6. Open Vipre and do a Deep System Scan. This should take a few minutes to a long time depending on your Hard Drive size.

7. This should find the PersonalAntiVirus and probable quite a few more. Make sure you remove all, not just quarantine.

8. Now install SuperAntiSpyware now. and Update it as well.

8. Under the Scan Your Computer select Preform a Complete Scan.

9. Vipre installed the main portion of PAV, but SuperAntiSpyware removes the remnants of it.

10. Again be sure to delete all, not just quarantine.

11. Reboot your computer.

12. Navigate to msconfig again and be sure to enable all. (if netfilter.exe is there uncheck that one.

13. Now re-enable System Restore.

14. We need to create a System Restore Point.

15. Navigate to System Restore VIA All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System Restore and create a New System Restore Point.

16. Reboot, and your done.

This has worked more then a dozen times for me now except one occasion. On this occasion PAV started up before Windows loaded. In this case I hooked up the hard drive to our system at work and removed it from that computer by scanning it with Vipre.

Hope this helps.

--KC

1 comment:

  1. Man you rock!!!! I thought for sure I would have to reformat. I LOVE YOU. This is awesome

    Rock and Roll Tech

    ReplyDelete

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