I can't believe it. For the fourth time in the past three weeks I had to drag my pc in. Prior it was all associated with a crash while downloading two different programs and driver problems. This time it was for a virus called, of all things, "Anti Virus 2009"!

During my last crash the tech's talked me into dropping Norton Anti Virus, for which I had a subscription, and they installed a free program called AVG. They claimed it was doing the best job of catching new stuff - better than Norton, McAfee, etc. OK.

Donna was doing some shopping at some sites last night. Suddenly a warning flashed up. She didn't tell me or show me, instead she cancelled the warning - which we all believe was a good warning from AVG. Then suddenly three different very professional looking windows opened showing all sorts of terrible discoveries. It said a spyware called Spyware.IE Monster.b was found (critical as it steals passwords), a Trojan virus called Trojan.Info dealer.Banker.s, etc. It was asking me to register, etc. I'm looking at all these pop-up windows that REALLY look like the real deal. Since I'd never seen a AVG alert I wasn't sure what I was looking at. Long story short .... they were not. They were all fake alerts which in the end, I'm told, end when you send in money which ends up finally in Russia. Then 6 months later some new alarms are set off that in turn end when you send money for another upgrade.

The tech said that all it took was to turn of AVG once for it to load or for one of us to click somewhere on the window. Which one us did, probably me, since I never saw the real warning and I was struggling to figure out if the warnings were from AVG because everytime I tried cancelling the alert there was another pop-up that would make me think twice.

Finally, I backout of everything, put it in safe mode, and did a virus scan in which three files were found bad. But when I reopened in normal the same warning windows popped up and knew for sure something was wrong... sure enough a virus, which the shop removed for $75 today. He said they are seeing so many of these - Anti Virus 2007, Anti Virus 2008, and Anti Virus 2009 - you would not believe it.

Now I am really struggling on which anti-virus software to use. I never had any problems while using Norton in the past ten years. I change and suddenly get one within a week. I talked to a friend who spent a life time working with computers and he still believes Norton is tops.

Any recommendations? I realize this is a little like asking what's the best religion.

 

Shop at better online sites. Most of the major players review there sites constantly.

curious to know what shopping site she was on.

 

Dave, I think my employer got suckered into buying that virus protection.

It did clear up the problem, but from what you say, they'll be back!

I stick with Norton, both at home and at the office.

Not sure why the boss got "zapped" as his Norton should be updated as mine is.

 

She was shopping for a miniture christmas tree.... I think it was some craft site. I'll see if she remembers.

 

on man I hate browser hijack applications.
one advantage of Firefox vs IE is seems to be more robust since fewer people use it.

 

My employer (a big multinational computer company that shall remain nameless) has switched back and forth between Mcafee and Symantec.

You should note that the free version of AVG has limited functionality when compared to the versions you pay for. Your subscription to Norton probably did more than the free version of AVG.

Differences between free AVG and pay versions

CNET.com's review of AVG 8

 

I use AOL (Yup I am still paying for aol...although not much...Sandy loves the UI and refuses to give it up.) They use McAfee. I have not had a virus issue on my PC or hers in several years.

 

Posts like this just reaffirm my dedication to Macs. We don't let our PC see the internet so it's safe, I hope.

 

I feel your pain. I've had to beat this thing to death on 4 or 5 workstations at work and it's a real PITA to remove completely. None of the users could remember the exact sequence of message boxes that made the virus go live or even how they responded.

Who is your ISP? If it's Comcast I just use the McAffee suite they let you have for free at home.

Another useful and free tool is Super AntiSpyware (http://www.superantispyware.com/) which will remove a lot of malware that's not technically a virus but is software you didn't mean to load and don't want on your PC.

You can also Google the name of the faux application and sometimes find concise instructions for removing it.

 

Mike there is NO reason to pay for AOL unless you use it to dial up?

AOL is free to anyone who brings their own connection. I switched my Mom over about a year ago. You just won't get any of their great customer service if you are a "free" customer.

You can make the change on AOL/billing.