"Personal Antivirus" - help anyone

[HopeImLucky]

I have just spent about 2 hours trying to get rid of " Personal Antivirus" from my wife's PC. No joy.

It has lodged itself in I think its called the tray - the bit at the bottom of the screen where firefox, norton etc would sit.

Every 30 to 60 seconds it is throwing out terrible notifications about the PCs health. Such as " xxx virus found. This will attach itself to internet explorer and upload personal details to the host website." Or "trojan xxx found. This trojan attaches itself to the current users start-up programs and attempts to steal passwords."

I know these notifications are bogus at present but what is REALLYYYYYYY worrying me is that I have found an equivalent executable file on her hard disc. I am interpreting this as meaning that all the trojans, viruses and worms etc (Idon't know the difference between any of them) are going to be released if this file is activated. I also am too scared to shut the PC down in case they are released on the restart. You all know some "updates" require a restart.

The PCs OS is windows vista home premium.

I have tried START > CONTROL PANEL > CHANGE/REMOVE PROGRAMS. The program didn't appear on this list.

I then went through all of the control panel features to see if I could find it. No luck there either.

Next I went to START and used the "search" feature. I entered 'personal' and got "PERSONAL ANTIVIRUS" as a result, listed under "PROGRAMS". So I went back to the control panel. Still not listed there. Not that big a surprise really.

Tried "search" again. "PERSONAL ANTIVIRUS" appeared again. This time my wife noticed that when the pointer was at "PERSONAL ANTIVIRUS", its address? path? was being displayed.

This was PAV (C:\program files\Personal AV)

So I went to START > COMPUTER > C: > Program Files > Personal AV

I hit del and windows warning message came up. Something like "if you started this action click below to continue."
I clicked and got a similar message. Clicked again along the lines of "send this to the recycle bin" and got a message telling me I needed permission to do this!!!!!!!!!!!!! From "PERSONAL ANTIVIRUS" owners!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I tried right-clicking, and from that menu 'delete'. Same story

Has anyone any ideas?

I'm no whizzkid and I've run out.

The bit that really p1sses me off is she didn't even download it.

Any help will be welcome

PS Sorry ulti this is why I wasn't playing like I said I would. I haven't even been drinking like I said I would lol

Please help anyone

[ilovekerry]

i had that happen to me..im not sure how to get rid of it as i had to get my uncle to do it but it was always throwing warning signs for trojans up on the screen but he works with pcs so knows how to access codes as i couldnt remove the program

its l8 here so i cant ask him now but i can try get hold of him tomorrow( sorry) and ask what hedid if you havent got it sorted

hopefully someone can help ya though

[HopeImLucky]

anybody else any ideas? I don't want to have to beg shaun to ask his uncle lol.

[doolittle1]

I just had this the other day I had to restore to a point before it started

[Earp10]

on my last puter i had a prob so i saved everything important to disc then reformatted hard drive (option that said EVERYTHING will be lost) and it put it back to when i bought it. had to download all updates and a couple programs i used and downloaded pics etc. but without bein surgical with isolating where it dug itself into i essentially nuked it by reformatting lol. (be very careful with it though. it will set it to like when u first bought puter) ......think u might need a disc too....research a little before u listen to me though but thats how i annhialated my prob.

[Ausangel]

Hi HopeImLucky, I would run a full antivirus scan, (if you dont have one AVG is free) followed by a malware scan using a free program like adaware, spybot or one of those, make sure you use the full or deep scan options.

There is also info on the net regarding this Malware.

Aus

[War_n_tea_2]

Sooo many different types..

You say its on the task bar.. Can you right click > Properties and find its name and destination..

I'm no expert but will help best i can