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Just got infected by something called System Tool. Pretends to be anti-virus program but blocks access to task manager and Microsoft Security Essentials (which obviously didn't catch it). Do appear to have access to Windows Explorer. This is WinXP Home version. Any ideas?

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Rick Brown wrote:Just got infected by something called System Tool. Pretends to be anti-virus program but blocks access to task manager and Microsoft Security Essentials (which obviously didn't catch it). Do appear to have access to Windows Explorer. This is WinXP Home version. Any ideas?

Posted from my DroidX

Rick, we had that infection on the kids computer.. I tried PC tools & Spyhunter and neither could get rid of it.... QV was co-driving that weekend and fixed it right up---30 to 45 min later...

Don

Rick, try this:

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-r ... ystem-tool" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thanks for the recommendation, John, saw that in a few other places, too.

But I tried what a few others suggested and just did a system restore to yesterday. Simple, easy, free and it worked!

Glad you got it working!

Some of the more sophisticated malware (the ones from about 2-3 years ago come to mind) actually also infect your System Restore .

Just in case it happens again:

Usually as long as you are not part of the first group that gets malware, you can typically use one of the popular spyware removal tools w/ the latest updates to remove it (sometimes you need to be in safe mode or do some extra manual stuff). A very nice preliminary tool is "Hijackthis.exe". Then use the automatic removal tool of your choice (the one that works well depends on the specific malware you got).

Do you run a browser plug-in like Adblock Plus? I find that most ppl's PC's that I fix don't usually have that installed, which makes it a lot easier to click on spam/malcrap that is just a couple clicks away from things like System Tools.