I think I have been virused, despite having NOD-32 as my anti-virus program. I need to take me machine in and have it cleaned. I have a question: Is my data infected or just my operating system? I have two 250Gb SATA II hard drives in this machine. Do I need to reformat the both of them?

Just curious - Have you tried any of the online virus scans ?? Also, there are some portable virus scans you can run off of a thumb drive. Have you checked your "startup" in "msconfig" for any strange executables ? "Google" for more info. Also, if you're runing XP, you could try a "System Restore" to a date before your problems started. However, the newer viruses will negate System Restore making restoration impossible. Worth a try, though.
I'm sure you're aware any files or programs added after the System Restore date will be erased.
Reformatting will erase everything including data. Generally, viruses run off of some type of executable i.e. .exe, .com, .bat, .vbs, etc. So, your data files will probably be safe. I would also "Google" NOD32 to see if any viruses are known to slip through.
Good luck and I hope you don't have to reformatt.

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:
I think I have been virused, despite having NOD-32 as my anti-virus program. I need to take me machine in and have it cleaned. I have a question: Is my data infected or just my operating system? I have two 250Gb SATA II hard drives in this machine. Do I need to reformat the both of them?

If you have your data on the second hard drive, then it is there and you won't have to do anything to recover it.

Once your other hard drive has been reformated and the operating system installed, you can cess all your data.

But, if your data is on the hard disk that has the operating system - DON't FORMAT IT!

You need to transfer the data from it first. You can do this by connecting it as a second hard drive in another computer, get your data out of it, then have it reformated.

Once it's sorted get ZONE ALARM as a Firewall.
The free one is fine for XP or 32 bit Vista.

And AVG for anti-virus.

The final solution was to replace the existing hard drives with two new ones in the 500Gb flavor. During the discussion of the problem at the place where the machine is to be fixed, a friend who was with me said his computer has the very same problem: Searching for Subject X and being taken to a site offering great deals on shoes or whatnot. The search gets redirected to something entirely unrelated. Every now and then, the search results in a dark red screen with a window teling me my machine is under attack or something like that. Under that premise, we decided the data was possibly infected. So in the end, it was decided to replace the drives and set the infected ones aside for 60 days to allow the anti-virus programs to get whatever virus it is into the database so as to zap it when I transfer my data back onto the new drives. The way we have chosen to do it is not exactly what I had in mind, but I have accepted that it is probably a better way to go. The tech told me that even if a hard drive is wiped, the viruses can still remain or might be part of the data. I did not know that, but will not question it. I guess that is why the military reformats its trashed-out drives three times before destroying them entirely.

What would be a good anti-spyware program to get? I have one on my old Emachines (this one) called Spyware Terminator. I guess it works, but it constantly, constantly, constantly throws up a little red box asking me to Allow or Block stuff coming into my computer. Well, how the hell do I know if what's coming in is friend or foe? I just Allow everything. What the hell else can I do? I have no reference against which to check what streams into my machine. It will throw up the red box when I install a small image resizer from the web, et cetera.

I am supposed to get my big machine back tomorrow. We'll just have to see how it goes...

ZONE ALARM !!!

http://www.zonealarm.com/secur...rity.htm?cid=W100001