Today is a good day.

[Bengt77]

Ha ha ha!

Today is the day I defeated ISearchTech a.k.a. IST. For the uninformed among you, it is one of the most persistent and (therefore) one of the most hated spy-, ad- and/or malware 'products' around. For Windows, yes. We, at work, switched to using Firefox and Thunderbird some months ago, but sometimes Internet Explorer is still needed. In one of those instances, my work PC was infected with the IST malware.

But today, I defeated it! I had to use three programs to do so, but I managed to do it. Darn, is that stuff persistent! Ad-Aware, Spybot S&D and HijackThis, working together as an unbeatable team, did the job.

I feel good. Very off-topic for even the Community Discussion directory, I think, but I just had to tell the world.

I FEEL GOOD! YEAH! :D

[scem0]

http://www.userfriendly.org/illiad/wtf.jpg

scem0

[munkle]

Just think of all the productive things you could have been doing on your Mac instead...like surfing MR ;)

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

Not to bring you down or anything, but let me see if I get you right: You're happy because you had to spend a long time fighting of malware on a piece of pooh work computer? I would be mad as hell... :confused:

[asif786]

Not to bring you down or anything, but let me see if I get you right: You're happy because you had to spend a long time fighting of malware on a piece of pooh work computer? I would be mad as hell... :confused:


nah, trust me - you don't know how good it feels when you finally get rid of these things :D

i have to do it all the time with my mother's pc. it's a hard life for those pc users. :rolleyes: :D

[James Philp]

What's all this about? :confused:


:p

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

nah, trust me - you don't know how good it feels when you finally get rid of these things :D

i have to do it all the time with my mother's pc. it's a hard life for those pc users. :rolleyes: :DOh, yes I do... as designated computer "expert" in the family I've spend hours upon hours removing malware off other peoples PCs. And even if you get a certain satisfaction when the machine, after very much work, is clean, anger with stupid PC users and malicious malware writers clearly drowns any good feelings... :mad:

[asif786]

Oh, yes I do... as designated computer "expert" in the family I've spend hours upon hours removing malware off other peoples PCs. And even if you get a certain satisfaction when the machine, after very much work, is clean, anger with stupid PC users and malicious malware writers clearly drowns any good feelings... :mad:

heh, my bad. i assumed you'd been spoiled with a mac all your life ;)

but i guess we all get satisfaction when we complete even the smallest taks. i.e. when i'm designing a website, i make a list of all the files i need to edit/change and cross them off one by one. it kinda makes you feel better when you know you're *that much closer* to the end..right?

p.s. Mitthrawnuruodo -where did you get your username from? just curious :)

[Abstract]

Its a rollercoaster ride.

First there's the downside of starting up Adaware and Spybot, but then there's the anticipation of whether it'll actually work or not. Once you find out it didn't work and you still have the baddies, you hit rock bottom instantly, but after a few hours of crawling your way up, you SPEED towards the top when you finally get rid of the bloody thing, AND IT FEELS SO GOOD!

Its like when you hold in your pee for a long time. Sure its frustrating (and dangerous :p ), but once you let it flow, you don't think anything else can feel this good. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh...... [/worst analogy ever]

[Koodauw]

Well today is a good day for other reasons as well.

[asif786]

Its like when you hold in your pee for a long time. Sure its frustrating (and dangerous :p ), but once you let it flow, you don't think anything else can feel this good. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh...... [/worst analogy ever]

yeah..except for when you stop needing to go and then it comes back at a totally inconvenient time.. :mad: hehe :)

[mkrishnan]

We, at work, switched to using Firefox and Thunderbird some months ago, but sometimes Internet Explorer is still needed. In one of those instances, my work PC was infected with the IST malware.

So, erm... I am curious. Are you using WinXP Pro or Win2k, and do you have it set so admin privileges are required to install? And if so, it can still sneak it's way on???? And how did it happen? Did it actually come from the site you *needed* to visit, or did you just do other stuff in IE while you had it open, and get stung? :(

[scem0]

A friend of the family stayed at the house last night and I just woke up and got on the computer to find IE open. I have a feeling that my computer is crawling with viri :eek:. Plus, I hate it when people use my computer without asking - I have 'important files' on here :, so I'm already irked.

scem0

[Bengt77]

So, erm... I am curious. Are you using WinXP Pro or Win2k, and do you have it set so admin privileges are required to install? And if so, it can still sneak it's way on???? And how did it happen? Did it actually come from the site you *needed* to visit, or did you just do other stuff in IE while you had it open, and get stung? :(
My work PC is running Windows XP Professional. There is an admin account on it, but it's not mine. I can't really install any applications myself. Well, that is if an installer requires admin rights, and many don't these days, which is frustrating. Out of security reasons, no application at all should be allowed to be installed without admin rights. Of course, the 'installers' for spy-, ad- and malware do not require those rights.

I think I got 'my' malware from an ad of some kind. Don't really know where it came from, actually. It just was there. But, as I said, I defeated it the day before yesterday and it hasn't shown itself since then. HijackThis apparently is quite good at eleminating malware.

[dotdotdot]

Right now as a PC user: Man, I feel your pain! I hate spyware!

When I get a Mac: What the hell is "spy ware?"