Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Beefcake on February 12, 2007, 10:57:06 AM
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Well last night while surfing youtube, my computer was infected with the malware program cowabanga. I knew something was wrong fairly quickly and I shut down my Internet connection so it wouldn't download anything while I was trying to figure out what to do. I found the Cowabanga by OIM program in my Add/Remove panel but whenever I tried to remove it, it would popup a "please enter the number below thingy to remove" which I didn't trust at all and I just canceled. I tried to delete the folder from Program Files but it couldn't as it was running a process, so I booted up Ad-Aware and let it do a couple of scans. Ad-Aware found and killed the process as well as the keys for it, and once that was done I was able to delete it from my C drive, which seem to have killed the popups and random icons showing up.
My question is, does anyone know of a good, -TRUSTED- program that I can use to check my computer to see if there are any leftover parts or other hidden/dormant malware programs hiding on my computer? I'm not very computer savvy but I know that these little things can bury themselves deep in the computer.
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Well, ad-aware does the job for me, not sure of how to locate anything else. Usually I just search for random malware / spyware names in my registry, if anything appears I get rid of it and search my system for the file that was linked to the registry value.
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Actually while posting this I had something popup so the problem has not been fixed yet. I just unplugged my computer from the internet and went to my labtop to go online to check things.
I would check the registry but I don't know much about computers and I really don't want to screw mine up. However, I noticed while typing this that Ad-Aware keeps finding a registry value.
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I run Adaware, then Spy bot, and then if that doesn't work, I look up on Yahoo the process for getting rid of the program manually.
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Try Hijack This. works for me, just be careful with some of the tools.
check out this, other tools also but I havent tried any of them yet so do some research first.
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/programs.php
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i run avast anti virus, ad aware, registry mechanic
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http://www.superantispyware.com/
This is what I've been using lately for families Pc's when they get infected (which is too often).
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CWshredder, it's for browser hijacks but I've used it with success on some of the tougher spyware/malware. Other then that I just use Ad-aware but registry mechanic is also a really good tool.
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trend-micro
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Try these...
Link One (http://www.computing.net/security/wwwboard/forum/19060.html)
Link Two (http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=97064)
All I did was a Google search on it and checked the top two...
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Try avgfree.
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Originally posted by Beefcake
Well last night while surfing youtube, my computer was infected with the malware program cowabanga. I knew something was wrong fairly quickly and I shut down my Internet connection so it wouldn't download anything while I was trying to figure out what to do. I found the Cowabanga by OIM program in my Add/Remove panel but whenever I tried to remove it, it would popup a "please enter the number below thingy to remove" which I didn't trust at all and I just canceled. I tried to delete the folder from Program Files but it couldn't as it was running a process, so I booted up Ad-Aware and let it do a couple of scans. Ad-Aware found and killed the process as well as the keys for it, and once that was done I was able to delete it from my C drive, which seem to have killed the popups and random icons showing up.
My question is, does anyone know of a good, -TRUSTED- program that I can use to check my computer to see if there are any leftover parts or other hidden/dormant malware programs hiding on my computer? I'm not very computer savvy but I know that these little things can bury themselves deep in the computer.
didnt read the replies, but hijack this usually does the trick, be careful not to zap a necessry thing tho.
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A friend of mine who has worked in the IT industry for quite a while suggested this (http://www.webroot.com/consumer/products/spysweeper/?id=HOME-HHO-boxshot&WRSID=93b9f02bf573a2f36c471edc6459b43c) to me. Upon trying the software, it is awesome, although it isn't free. IMO though, it's well worth it.
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For free try
http://www.ewido.net/en/ (http://www.ewido.net/en/)
I find Ewido was able to remove things AdAware and Mcaffy wouldnt.
Was also able to find thing neither did also
Another handly little tool is
EasyCleaner2.0 (http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm)
The Startup inspecter might be particularly helpful in your case
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Originally posted by Helrazr1
A friend of mine who has worked in the IT industry for quite a while suggested this (http://www.webroot.com/consumer/products/spysweeper/?id=HOME-HHO-boxshot&WRSID=93b9f02bf573a2f36c471edc6459b43c) to me. Upon trying the software, it is awesome, although it isn't free. IMO though, it's well worth it.
How big a footprint does it leave?
that is how many processes does it have running?
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I've used Spysweeper for the last two years. works fine, doesnt always get everything, thats why i have Hijack This. only 1 process running when its off SpySweeper.exe 312K, IE browser shields. When you are running it there are 3 processes Spysweeper.exe from 548 to 22,076k; SpySweeperUI.exe 1,800k to 2,100 and SSU.exe 3,036k
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After you clean your system, I suggest changing your browser settings, or you'll be right back in the same place again in a few days.
If you're using Internet Explorer, go to internet options, security, then disable ActiveX and scripting in advanced. You can add sites such as here or microsoft for updates to Trusted Sites. Just put *.microsoft.com or *.hitechcreations.com etc. and ActiveX will work for those sites.
ActiveX is the scourge of the internet seas.
You won't need any spyware or adware or virus software at all. Or, use another browser. ;)
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Look no further (http://www.emsisoft.com/en/software/download/)
There isn't anything better that I have come across for malware, trojans, and viruses.
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I wanted to thank everyone for the input, I hope I can take care of the problem tonight.
Phew.... some these things look pretty complicated. I have Ad-Aware now and I'm going to try Spybot, SUPERantispyware, AVG, and maybe Spydoctor later unless anyone has reason for me not too. Also as anyone actually had the Cowabanga thing and can they tell me what they did?
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Keep in mind, I use the FREE A-Squared that is in the link provided.
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I just googled "Cowabanga removal" and came up with this http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=97064
It's a lot of steps but might be worth it if you can't get rid of it any other way.
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Thank you for all the help everyone. I think I may have nailed it. I used the Ad-aware/Spybot combo and I think it worked. Before I tried Spybot I would run Ad-Aware and everytime it ran it would detect a process running. It would delete it and then on restart it would be back again durning the next scan. After I ran spybot it looks to have nailed the Cowabanga Keys and Ad-Aware stopped seeing a process running on restart. Knock on wood I hope its gone.
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stop looking at porn
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remember alot of times you have to be in "Safe mode" to successfully get rid of bugs... (They like to cling to a host process thats running and cant be deleated when there in that state)
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Originally posted by DREDIOCK
How big a footprint does it leave?
that is how many processes does it have running?
If it's active, 3, but it doesn't have to run all of the time like some do. It can be turned off to play AH