AIM virus??

AXJules · #1 11-16-2003, 01:24 PM

At the risk of this being in the wrong place....

My friend was using AIM yesterday and clicked on someone's "info" to see their away message. "LOOK WHAT I FOUND!" popped up, and suddenly all this porn and spyware started downloading onto her computer.
She called her friend, who told her she didn't put that link in her profile.
Be really careful using AIM!! Apparently it's a new virus, and you can get it if someone IM's you. I've heard it's a bitch to get off your computer.

Has anyone else heard about this?

AUDeltaGam · #2 11-16-2003, 01:55 PM

I've seen in on people's profiles and clicked on it. And then I had to get a program to delete spyware, because a bunch got on to my computer! So be careful!!

Lady Pi Phi · #3 11-16-2003, 02:03 PM

Where can you find these programs to delete spyware?

kddani · #4 11-16-2003, 02:07 PM

i was wondering about this... i saw it in a couple of my friends' profiles. didn't click on it because i didn't recognize the link. i thought something was weird about it. good call posting this!

PM_Mama00 · #5 11-16-2003, 02:29 PM

I clicked on my friend's and it went to that realpx.com or something like that. It just kept a pop up asking me to download something. I kept clicking now, but it kept showing up. After a while of clicking no, it went away.

AXJules · #6 11-16-2003, 04:46 PM

Just so you guys know-
Adaware and the like are really good programs, but they will not remove everything off your computer. I occasionally downloaded music last year on Kazaa LITE and constantly ran Adaware. suddenly my Internet explorer stopped working...over time, it would take 3 minutes to turn on the laptop, my computer couldn't recognize any drivers (this means no cd burner, no zip drive, no old files) and search completely disappeared. I took it to a computer repair place and they said I had so much spyware and assorted crap that my computer's memory was totally gone. Although EXPERTS removed all of it, my computer was still so F^($&$ up that I had to buy a new one.

It's almost better to just avoid all that crap from the beginning than depend on a spyware removal tool.

AXJules · #7 11-16-2003, 04:58 PM

I didn't buy a computer from them.

They are good friends of my father's, many of whom have worked for Microsoft. My point is that even people who really knew what they were doing missed a bunch of crap because of the way it hides itself. And, the damage was still there after it was taken off. Yes, I could have reformatted a bunch of things and reinstalled the computer, but that would have been almost as $$$ as getting a new one (according to them.)

absolutuscchick · #8 11-16-2003, 06:13 PM

crap...even after reading this thread I accidentally clicked on it! What the hey!! Luckily I just clicked close on everything and only one porn site popped up!

#9 11-16-2003, 08:44 PM

Thanks for posting this because I had clicked on that "LOOK AT WHAT I FOUND" thing on a buddy's profile and I downloaded the spybot program and fixed the problems.

AGDee · #10 11-17-2003, 07:35 AM

Webroot's Spy Sweeper is a pretty good one. It looks for adware and spyware. You can get a free trial version from www.tucows.com. You can't update the scan files without subscribing and a subscription is $29.95 a year. That's cheaper than computer repairs though! You do have to be careful and read about what it finds. One of the things it identified as Spyware for me is actually part of Turbo Tax. It warned me though that Turbo Tax might not work if I deleted that file.

You'll be pretty amazed the first time you run one of these programs if you surf the net a lot.

Dee

TigerLilly · #11 11-17-2003, 10:01 AM

Well, shit, I did the same thing you did, absolutuscchick.
Do I need to run that spyware stuff now? I didn't let anything install on my computer and that link's not appearing in my profile...
BTW, I assume that if I install one of those spyware programs, it won't install any extra spyware or anything in my computer, right?

absolutuscchick · #12 11-24-2003, 03:23 PM

Ok guys I'm really worried right now. Every web page I look on has words like "love" "reading" "wing" with a link to some love site on them.......like all over gc if I see any of these words it'll turn into a link. I don't know what to do. Also, I have about 5 million pop up windows.....I recently downloaded adaware and have run it like 5 times but its not helping!! What should I do?!

PhiPsiRuss · #13 11-24-2003, 03:53 PM

Unless you need dental office management software, get a Mac. They are soooooooooo much easier, you will be so much more productive, and you won't have to worry about evilware autoinstalling from AIM.

absolutuscchick · #14 11-25-2003, 02:18 AM

Ok, I installed adaware and the spybot program decadence reccomended but I'm still having pop up windows all the time...and I even started using Avant Browser but I'm still getting the pop ups and I don't know what to do!!

FAB*SpiceySpice · #15 11-25-2003, 02:25 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by russellwarshay
Unless you need dental office management software, get a Mac. They are soooooooooo much easier, you will be so much more productive, and you won't have to worry about evilware autoinstalling from AIM.

AMEN!!!! I absolutely adore my Mac and this is like the 4th one I've had. I've been using Macs since I was a little tiny kid though, so that may be why I like them so much better. Seriously though folks, I think they're so much easier to use than PCs!!!