Antispyware 2009 virus (malware)

The latest comptuer virus to be seen in my area is a variant of the Antivirus 2009. It came in as Antispyware 2009. None of the usual cleaners worked. All the sites I went to to find fixes caried me to the same spot (as re-directs) stopzilla. Now I am not in any position to say for sure, but wouldn't this kind of look like stopzilla created this strain and are looking for more business? And if so, is that not illegal to introduce a virus for monitary gain?

The strain was a hard one to fix. You have to find an alternative cleaner and re-name the exe file to install it. Most regualr programs work, but any cleaner I found would simply not run. I have always been of the opinion that nobody would need virus software if it wasn't for viruses, so it only makes sense as to who creates them. I know, proving it is a different story.

There are lists of what to remove posted. Go into Safe Mode and it is relatively easy. It also deleted some elements of my anti-virus software so I had to reinstall that afterward.

A Google should bring up a list of how to cleanly remove it. In my case it was one folder of files and deleting a registry entry along with reinstalling my McAfee software. Now McAfee stops it from installing altogether. This is the first thing I've had slip through in years.

malwarebytes and superantispyware ran in safe mode will clean it out.
both can be found on download.com Run them on each user account. until they come up clean and then boot into "normal" mode and run once more.

I clean this crap off systems almost daily.

reply to post by Blaine91555


I have dealt with this one on a much easier level in the past. It just got nastier and I thought I would vent about it. Besides, if someone else on here gets it, they might find some help. The biggest change with it was that it re-directed all search tags about the virus to various sites all selling stopzilla. And it wouldn't let malwarebytes load. I have to use combofix. Even that had to be downloaded on another pc and transfered then renamed. I guess I had to earn that paycheck. I miss the old days.

reply to post by staple


just remember the above post if you get the strain in question. Safe mode was to no avail this time.

reply to post by network dude


Combofix is also a good solution. Don't worry about the warnings of running it. It will leave your system in a working state. I agree that you should have the tools downloaded to a flash drive as the infected machine will not let you browse to these files and get them. I explain it like it is trying to fix an engine while it is running. There will be some things you will not be able to do. If you really want to get involved, remove the hard drive and scan it on another machine that has NOD32 installed on it. It is the first thing I usually do for clients.
I had an actual client pay for antivirus 2008. Romania of all places.

I have used malwarebytes to remove this virus on multiple occations.

Download it and update it and run it in full.

That will remove it, but it may take 30-60 min's depending on your computer.
download.cnet.com...