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First Advice

February 4, 2009 By Michael Kavka Leave a Comment

So, as I was at work today, I got a call to go out on my 7th virus removal in the last 6 weeks. Yeah 1 a week at different clients does seem a bit much, but considering how skittish people are at running Windows Updates, things like this happens.

To those who want to know what I tend to use to clean machines of malware, let me tell you.

First off turn off the System Restore. Malware loves to hide there and it is nigh impossible to clean out of the restore points. Kill them, get rid of them.

Now then the software I use includes Ad-Aware, Malwarebytes, Spybot, and HiJack This. If possible keep these programs with their latests versions on your USB thumb drive. They are invaluable.

Make sure that they are as up to date as possible (yes sometimes you need to run them without checking for updates cause the malware will prevent updates from being downloaded) in safe mode.

Just remember google is your friend in these instances, and removal of the malware can take a long time. If you can just wipe and reload the machine, that of course is the preffered method, but use your own judgement.

Filed Under: Computers Tagged With: Ad-Aware, Anti-virus, Computers, HiJack This, Malware, Malwarebytes, Microsoft, Spybot, Virus, Virus Removal, Windows

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