Re: How does malware launch
- From: Wolf Kirchmeir <wolfkir@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2008 10:31:51 -0400
GeorgeWBush wrote:
A friend's computer has over the past few months become very sluggish on her DSL internet downloads. I strongly suspect spyware or other such malware.
If her anti-malware program is up to date, a more likely cause is lack of basic maintenance. see below.
I use a program called Startup Control Panel. It has five tabs, corresponding to all the places - Startup (user), Startup (common), HKLM/run, HKCU/run, and Run Once - that can launch programs at startup. The program lets me enable or disable any of the programs listed under each tab.
Problem is, I don't see anything suspicious. Where do malware programs hide so programs like Startup CP can't find them?
Thanks,
Ray
They hide where such utilities can't find them... ;-) See David Lipman's response.
Ray, I don't know what your level of expertise is, so the following maybe be redundant for you. But your question indicates that you think you can find malware just by looking for it. It's not that simple. Anyhow, Startup CP just turns off programs, it doesn't remove them. Simply turning off malware isn't enough. Usually, every time the computer reboots, and/or the infected file is run, the malware reinstalls.
IOW, you need good anti-malware programs (and please note the plural.) If your friend hasn't kept her AV program up to date, then some bad stuff may have sneaked in.
Get at least three good anti-malware programs, and run them. AVG, Avast, Avira, Kapersky, Counterspy, Spybot Search and Destroy, Nod32, etc. have all been recommended here and elsewhere. Some are free, others offer free demos. After running each one separately, and rebooting every time, install one of them to start up at boot. I would run them all in Windows Safe Mode with networking turned off, BTW.
Avoid Norton and MacAfee.
In addition to cleaning up malware, the computer probably needs basic regular maintenance. Clean up your friend's computer.
For example, if the downloads folder has lots of entries, just preparing it to receive another download can take several seconds. Rule one of maintaining a fast computer is to get rid of any and all files that you no longer need. A lot of downloads are used only once, so why leave them on the HD? Etc.
CClean (donation ware) is very good cleaner of temporary files, browser caches, etc. (It also has a registry cleaner, but wouldn't recommend its use without a pretty good understanding of what the registry is for.) Then get a defragmenter. I use the one from Auslogic, it's free, and does a better job than the one that comes with Windows. For registry cleaning I use Registry Mechanic, it's unaggressive, which means it doesn't flag all possible problems, rates the severity of the ones it does flag, and (so far) has never messed up my registry.
HTH
--
Wolf Kirchmeir
.
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