malware

Carolyn thinks she got attacked by a virus. MalwareBytes says there's over 174 viruses on her machine. Leo says there might not be. There may be malware on it, but sometimes Malware Bytes gives a false positive on cookies and calls them viruses. She'll also want to be sure that she got MalwareBytes from the >official MalwareBytes site. Carolyn really should just make a recovery, back up her data, wipe the drive, and then run the recovery utility. It's the only way to be sure that she's free of viruses.

Ron has a problem that any time he tries to buy something on Amazon.com, his computer crashes. Leo says Ron may want to try resetting the browser. That will clear out whatever is deep inside the browser cache. If that doesn't solve it, then there may be some malware that is taking advantage of his web surfing.

Bill's computer was bit by ransomware. His computer has been locked and encrypted and the hacker won't open it until he pays for it. Leo says the problem is that there's no guarantee they will unlock it or if they do, they can just lock him down again. There's not much he can do but format the hard drive and restore from a backup. But he shouldn't ever pay the ransom.

The Old Geek is worried about bad flashlight apps which could be malware. Leo says there's nothing to worry about. Both the Android and iOS app stores scan all apps and disable those that have malware. And even better, today's modern OS offers that flashlight capability natively.

Walter got an icon on his Windows machine called "Launch System Healer," and later found out it's malware. How can he get rid of it? Leo says that the problem with malware is that it can be very difficult to get rid of and even if he does, he may not get rid of all of it. But it's called a "PUP" or "potentially unwanted program." It should have an uninstaller, so Walter should look for that. Chances are, Walter accidentally installed it when installing something else that had its own custom installer.

Joanne has gotten a WinZip popup that says she needs to scan and repair her computer. Leo says that is likely a phishing scam that wanted to get her to click on something and install it. She should be very careful with links that she didn't request. She shouldn't accept offers from strangers, as it's likely malware.

Steve bought a Lenovo Windows 7 PC a few years back. He recently wound up getting the Taplika virus with non stop pop up ads in his browser. Leo says he'll need to install "VPlay" from Add/Remove programs and then remove Taplika from his browser. Technically it's not a virus, but a browser hijack and that should get rid of it. VPlay is a Windows service, and that is very insideous. It's going to make it harder to get rid of. He can find more information at malwaretips.com

Scott wants to know if doing a restore would get rid of any malware that may be on the system after its been compromised. Leo says yes, it will. Those popups are trying to get you to call them and install software. So if he didn't do that, he's probably OK. But if he did, not only will he need to get rid of the malware, but if they charged him, they will now have his credit card information. So he'll not only have to backup his data and erase the hard drive, he'll have to cancel that credit card as well.

George wants to know how to avoid malware. Leo says to practice safe computing. Here's a few steps: