You're nuts. From what I've heard, most of those keygens are backdoor trojans. Do you know how to "clean install" windows? That's the only way to completely get rid of virus/trojan. After you clean-installed windows, I suggest you use a sandbox apps like Reboot Restore (free) or DeepFreeze ($45)--there are many on the market beside these) that instantly reverts your system back to the previous snapshot after reboot. So, if you ever accidentally installed a virus, simply reboot the computer and the virus will be gone.
+1 Just refornat and modify your internet behavior - no porn, torrents and downloading from non trusted sites
Ugh. You could easily have a rootkit on there. If you have it's extremely hard (often impossible) to remove. Try Kaspersky (TDDR Killer?) ESET , Malwarebytes...but specifically anti-rootkit solutions If you have a rootkit, the best solution is to wipe your hardrive with dban, and start from scratch. 7 years now since I divorced Windows...
Yeah, I threw everything at it.... I tried restarting in safe mode and I did not see a difference. So......last night I reinstalled Windows10. I never did that before. There were 3 options and I used the one that says 'save all my shortcuts' etc.... It took 2.5 hours to cycle through everything but it finished. Don't do this if you are in a hurry. All my shortcuts were in the same place as they were before . But the drivers for my printer have to be reloaded. I lost my Kapersky and Windows Office subscription....I have not found the old disks I used to reload them yet.... I reloaded MBAM and Spybot. I'll find a rootkit program and try that as well. I had to reset Google as my browser and eliminate a few of the things MSFT had pinned to the startup windows. There were several little things I had to do to personalize it again. It was like getting a new computer out of the box again. But......it seems to be running much better now. Much faster. Before, it would take a full minute just to load a page I clicked on...it's not an exaggeration. It was okay for a backup laptop, but I may have extended its life. It only has 4GB RAM and 500GB HD, but it will get the job done. It's good for a backup. Thanks for everyone's suggestions.
In the future use belarc advisor, it will display all software installed and the associated licenses and product keys for future reference. TIP: Uninstall all browser extensions, Then run basic virus scan : delete all threats, Then run the following: (deleting all threats as detected) #1, Malwarebytes - anti malware #2, Malwarebytes - rootkit scanner/remover (in beta) #3, adwcleaner - auto adware cleaner optional kaspersky - TDS killer When system adware free, then add only one extension back at a time, and go through the list again... to eliminate extensions with packaged Malware/adware... if No adware detected - Note to self that extension clean if adware detected, uninstall, clean go to next extension Browser extensions are a major source of adware/malware... I am down to only using (chrome) #1, AdBlock #2, Gmelius for Gmail #3, Google Keep #4, Google Translate Most everything else adds malware, alternate search engines, re-directs, promoted ad's, etc... Took a long time to narrow down the list, but worth the effort... Good luck
You can also use uMatrix (firefox, chrome, opera) extension (from the makers of uBlock) to monitor/block the behind-the-scenes traffic of browser extensions. IOW, you can more quickly/easily spot a rogue extension this way, imo.
nice tips.. hmmm, umatrix is excellent. thanks userque and NoBias for the ideas. Once you have umatrix, what else do you feel you need in the way of adblockers etc?
I also use ghostery. Only because it helps (and makes it easier) with determining which items to block in uMatrix (after a while, you develop a knack for which items to set/unset in the matrix). I used to use uBlock, but I think uMatrix does everything it does (not sure about the element picker yet though--a very nice feature of uBlock).
At the very least it's good practice to have 2 computers: 1 for general web surfing (and porn and illegal downloading) and 1 for business (i.e. trading) Something I've been experimenting with just over the last couple of weeks is Qubes which gives the same protections on a single computer by using virtual machines. It differs significantly from the familiar VM products like VirtualBox and VMware and is *much* more secure. Bottom line is if 1 of your VMs gets poisoned it doesn't affect the other VMs. You simply delete it and make a new one. All this is for naught if you don't have the discipline to separate your activities.