I'm posting this for a friend because she's lost internet access, and we'd both be very grateful for any help.
Last night she was browsing the internet when a program of some sort suddenly appeared to install itself on her computer. She then started getting messages from something called (I think) Windows Internet Security. It sounds like the standard trojan warning that the PC is infected with all sorts of things, followed by a link to a page to buy a program to remove them.
I'm not sure precisely what steps she took to try to remove it but she wasn't successful. Her computer no longer allows her internet access. She's on her way to an internet cafe now and will try to download anything you recommend as a safe starting point for trying to remove the trojan.
I don't know whether this is a symptom of the infection, but earlier this afternoon she tried to boot into safe mode with networking in order to try to connect to the net and get to this site. She pressed the F8 key repeatedly and got to the place where she chose safe mode with networking, but she was then offered a choice between loading (i) the Windows Recovery Console or (ii) XP Professional. (Her OS is XP Home.) Since neither of us knows any significant amount of DOS she tried the XP Professional option, but she was then presented with a screen that showed strange symbols and the OS didn't load.
Apologies for sounding vague: she and I were connected by telephone and I wasn't able to see what was happening on her screen.
Many thanks for any help.
Edited to say: Dee's been able to post now so please direct any help to her thread rather than mine. Thanks for reading!
Last night she was browsing the internet when a program of some sort suddenly appeared to install itself on her computer. She then started getting messages from something called (I think) Windows Internet Security. It sounds like the standard trojan warning that the PC is infected with all sorts of things, followed by a link to a page to buy a program to remove them.
I'm not sure precisely what steps she took to try to remove it but she wasn't successful. Her computer no longer allows her internet access. She's on her way to an internet cafe now and will try to download anything you recommend as a safe starting point for trying to remove the trojan.
I don't know whether this is a symptom of the infection, but earlier this afternoon she tried to boot into safe mode with networking in order to try to connect to the net and get to this site. She pressed the F8 key repeatedly and got to the place where she chose safe mode with networking, but she was then offered a choice between loading (i) the Windows Recovery Console or (ii) XP Professional. (Her OS is XP Home.) Since neither of us knows any significant amount of DOS she tried the XP Professional option, but she was then presented with a screen that showed strange symbols and the OS didn't load.
Apologies for sounding vague: she and I were connected by telephone and I wasn't able to see what was happening on her screen.
Many thanks for any help.
Edited to say: Dee's been able to post now so please direct any help to her thread rather than mine. Thanks for reading!
