Help!!!

[MerkabaStar]

So I was on my comp today, went somehwere and now I have a virus. I tried to download some music and figured I might have gotten it there. It's typical in that it's putting up some kind of Virus alert and acting like its searching then wants me to pay with a credit card. I can see my desktop but then the screen is taken over by this thing. I can't access my task manager to try to end the program either. Its a new icon on the bottom on my taskbar. It says "System Tool" and has a window doing this and that acting like its doing something. I clicked it off and my desktop is now saying "Warning You're computer is infected with spyware.." Yes with bad You're context to boot! .....written in red, with binary 0101 coverng the desktop background. Also when I hover over some new icon it says my spysweeper has a virus.

I have a Toshiba laptop running vista. Is there an easy way to get rid of this? I don't want to have to go pay 100 bucks or something like that if I can do it myself. I don't know diddly about this sort of thing but I know sometimes it's easy for those that do know. I know my way around a computer basically but know nothing about programming or any of that. I've heard of safe mode, etc., but never had to use these things.

Ok I googled "system tool " virus and i'm reading around. I'm only afraid that some of this stuff might be a waste and want me to eventually buy something. I'll keep reading but if anyone wants to help please do.

THanks for any help.

 

[blondie101010]

You should restart in safe mode ( Starting computer in safe mode | Solutions to anything and everything ) with networking.

Download, install and run MalwareBytes ( Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware: Malwarebytes ).

That should do it.

 

[detox1]

my dad got this same thing, its not a virus, just a pain in the a$$.

 

[blondie101010]

my dad got this same thing, its not a virus, just a pain in the a$$.

Malware has become hard to define. You're right that this is not a virus as it doesn't reproduce itself but it's also more than a trojan as it's not hiding itself anymore. It doesn't really matter the name you give it, it's bad period.

But, this threat is actually very easy to remove, even manually, when you know what you're doing.

 

[MerkabaStar]

Ok...system restore did it. I had to be reminded of this by googled info. THanks for the responses. Nice forum I'll stick around!