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Choosing a Tape Drive
Tape drives remain the leading technology used by organizations for backup and archiving. However, the plethora of tape drives on the market can make choosing the appropriate tape drive a confusing task. How do you select a tape drive that satisfies...
Learn How To Install A Sound Card Fast
Sound Card installation is indeed simple and rather straight forward,that is,when you know how to do it. Opening the system unit can be a scary task for some of us,especially if we have not performed this task before. The key is to be calm,take...
Partitioning, Formatting and Reinstalling in Windows 98
Formatting and reinstalling windows 98 is very easy if you have the right know-how. This article will discuss how to format, partition and reinstall windows 98 on your PC. Before going ahead and doing this, it is important to be comfortable with...
Registry Cleaner: Protection for Your PC
Your personal computer saves all the processes that are happening within it. The operating system has its own log of these programs running, and changes that are happening within it. What is a registry cleaner? First you must understand what a...
The Importance Of Email Backup
Viruses, software failures, power failures, human errors, hard drive failures are only a few examples of what could destroy the data on a hard drive, including all documents, pictures, emails and other files! Most home computer users don't need...
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Spyware – Your Web Browser is the Culprit!
My first experience with a spyware BHO based infection was several months ago. I had gone through all of the usual steps with the client’s machine to clean it. Ad-Aware was run, Spybot: Search and Destroy was as well. Nothing looked suspicious in the system’s startup. All appeared well, but it wasn’t.
After extensive testing and no further symptoms I returned the computer to my client’s home. I hooked it back up, and dialed the internet. Everything so far was progressing smoothly. But, as SOON as I loaded Internet Explorer: BAM the same pop-up advertisements and other annoying things started happening again. With much embarrassment I had to take the computer back to my office and try again.
It was all Internet Explorers fault. Microsoft Internet Explorer comes with a feature that is designed to add third-party functionality to their browser. It’s actually a very good idea. Unfortunately, it now gets taken advantage of.
The producers of spyware know that many people now have spyware removers installed on their computers. They also know that quite a few people have the ability to check what is in their start-up. Because of this, BHO’s are crafted so that the spyware lies dormant until Internet Explorer is opened. Then it can start its dirty work.
The best program to remove an errant Browser
Help Object is HijackThis. This program was originally designed to remove homepage hijackers and gradually morphed into an all-around removal tool for everything. If there’s any one tool that I couldn’t part with it’s HJT.
To start, download HijackThis 1991. Once you’ve got it, open it. Click the button that says “Do a system scan only”. Following that, scroll down to the items labeled 02 – BHO. Remove anything here that looks suspicious. Internet Explorer does not require any BHO’s to run. Just keep an eye on the path that it loads from, and the name of the file. A legitimate one will be fairly easy to spot, as it’ll have a legit title and OK looking path.
If the filename looks like it was randomly made, like ASGSRT32.DLL or whatnot then there’s a good 90% chance that it’s bad. Even if you do remove one that’s good, you can always use the restore feature of HJT to bring it back.
If you need any other HijackThis help then read the previous link.
About the Author
Kevin Souter is a full time computer repair technician. He also operates a free spyware removal site, as well as a general computer repair site.
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