Antivirus Live Takeover / Susan Brown, Your Texas Connection, Keller Williams Realty

I was working on my computer the other night when a pop-up box came up on the lower right of my screen saying I had a virus.  From there everything became unbelieveable.  I clicked on the box to get rid of it but a bigger box came up in the middle of my screen.  It began showing all the files that had been affected by the virus.  I tried to close that - it wouldn't go away.  I tried to get to my home page.  I got the same box.  I restarted my computer a few times but always got stopped by the same boxes.  It was as if something had hijacked my computer.  Indeed it turns out it had.  I had been hijacked by Antivirus Live.  

Thankfully I was able to access the internet on my phone.  I found many websites with steps to get rid of Antivirus Live so I began to read what the steps were.  They ranged from restarting in a safe mode (F8) to right-clicking in the Start bar as quickly as possible before the virus could take over again.  That was what ended up working for me.

Here are the steps I followed (Thanks to Shami from Soft Sailor & Protected from Bleeping Computer)

• Restart computer, quickly right-click on the Start Task Bar, opening a box that has Task Manager
• Click on Task Manager, which will stay open regardless of the virus
• Click on the Processes Tab
• Make sure the box "Show Processes from All Users" is checked
• Then under image names, look for sysguard.exe Other letters can be in front of this file name like edsysguard.exe - so look carefully.  Left-click the file & click on End Process.  Make sure you do this for every file that has the sysguard.exe ending.
• Now click on Start, Control Panel and double-click on Internet Options
• Click on the Connections tab and Lan Settings on the lower right
• Make sure the Proxy Server box is NOT CHECKED.  (This is the way the virus takes over your computer) 
• Click OK

From here, you can get on the internet and get Malware to clean up the damage Antivirus Live has done to your computer.  Go to www.malwarebytes.org and download the Free version of malware.  When you have it on your computer, the home screen will offer you a choice of performing a quick scan or full scan.  Choose the quick scan.  AND WAIT.  This will take some time.  Be patient.  (Don't be worried by the purchase box on the bottom right.  You are not asked to buy anything here)

When completed, a box will appear saying "The scan completed successfully.  Click 'Show Results' to display all objects found." Click OK  and you'll see the number of files infected by the virus.  You check all of those and click on Remove Selected.  Then Exit.

All should be well again with your computer.  It was an experience to say the least.  Thank goodness I had another way to access the internet because I needed all the expertise I could find online.  

Susan Brown, Your Texas Connection sells real estate in Walden on Lake Houston, Eagle Springs, Summerwood, Atascocita, TX, Kingwood Greens, Royal Shores & Kingwood, TX - just to name a few!  Susan's the team leader for Your Texas Connection at Keller Williams Realty NE.  Visit their website for more in depth info about the team and what they can do for you.  Or call Susan direct (281) 415-1454 if you'd like her to start working on your behalf today!