Re: Keylogger warning

On 2009-08-24 09:45:04 -0700, DarkRose <swaims@xxxxxxxxxx> said:

Let this be a lesson to all:
About 2 months ago our GuildMaster got keylogged and lost control of
his account, his toons and out Guild Bank all got cleaned out. After
it was all straightened out by Blizzard, we (the guild) all
recommended he do a full format of his HDD and re-install everything.
He did not. He said his virus scanner caught and removed the
keylogger.
Saturday morning (Aug. 22) at 10:20 am EST, he lost his account
again... He and his g/f are on vacation atm, and are attempting to do
what they can via phone with no computer access (not sure where they
are vacationing).
Let the lesson be learned... After being hacked/keylogged, ALWAYS
reformat and start from scratch, it's the only way...
As an aside, he's been logged in for 3 days solid now, in Storm Peaks;
no one can locate his toon, even using Carbonite to attempt to track
him (I guess it can do that?) With him not being booted, that means
some activity must be taking place, what the hell is his toon doing?
Mining bot???

How do you know that it was a keylogger? Which keylogger was it? How did it get there? If you don't know that, then you don't know that it was a keylogger. You are just guessing.

More likely the account was phished or somebody hacked his email account or someone managed to persuade a customer service rep at Blizzard to let them have access to his account. In that event, reformatting the hard drive would be useless.

Also, reformatting the hard drive is not always possible. Many computers ship without disks these days, making restoration of the OS impossible. Even if you get a disk, the disk might still lack software that came with the machine -- that would be gone forever. Restoring data or software from a backup might well restore any virus with which they were infected. Neither does it guarantee that the victim will not immediately get the virus from the same place he got it the first time. Reformatting the hard disk seems akin to treating fleas by shooting the dog. You will still have fleas, but now the dog is dead.

It may well be that reformatting the disk is the only option. However, it should be a last resort, not a first resort. I certainly would not reformat simply on some self-styled 'expert's' guess that I had a keylogger. And if things are that bad you should probably give up using computers at all.

Use an authenticator. It is not perfect, but it is far less damaging than nuking your computer because someone who does not even have access to your machine is absolutely certain that you have a keylogger.

--
Waddling Eagle
World Famous Flight Instructor

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Ahhh crap I got compromised
    ... The clowns who tell you to reformat your hard disk and reinstall Windows are forgetting a few things that make such a strategy highly impractical. ... They know every internet rumor out there, but they have a nasty tendency to blame 'viruses,' 'trojans,' and 'keyloggers' without being able to tell you exactly which virus, trojan or keylogger has actually compromised your World of Warcraft account. ...
    (alt.games.warcraft)
  • Re: Keylogger warning
    ... About 2 months ago our GuildMaster got keylogged and lost control of ... He said his virus scanner caught and removed the ... Saturday morning at 10:20 am EST, he lost his account ... You're assuming it was the same keylogger and it's not that he's just ...
    (alt.games.warcraft)
  • Re: PASSWORDS
    ... Most firewalls won't detect a keylogger but they will detect if a keylogger ... have a firewall installed, check the logs for suspicious activity. ... there is a hidden administrator account in XP and it is called ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.accessibility)
  • Re: Apparent rash of hacked accounts???
    ... it and this keylogger got installed on your computer. ... When a image like above takes over your browser, ... could just access the memory of WoW.exe as it has gathered the account ... If you haven't cleaned your system (preferably a fresh install), ...
    (alt.games.warcraft)
  • Re: Keylogger warning
    ... About 2 months ago our GuildMaster got keylogged and lost control of ... Saturday morning at 10:20 am EST, he lost his account ... no one can locate his toon, even using Carbonite to attempt to track ... How do you know that it was a keylogger? ...
    (alt.games.warcraft)