Make sure your anti-virus is up to date folks!

[Navron]

I got hit by an extremely malicious computer virus out of freaking nowhere. Went by the name of XP Security 2012, and made itself look like a legit anti-virus program. Knowing wiser, I didn't click ANYTHING, and instead went straight to my actual AV program. Well, here's the deal.

- The virus blocks you from running any AV or spyware program. Even PC cleanup programs were blocked too.
- The virus blocks you from accessing the internet by routing your requests to nowhere.
- It replicates itself in about 50 areas, and cloaks them all. Downside is any one of those individual ones can reproduce any you delete, so you have to delete ALL traceable entries for it to go away.
- The virus prevents you from accessing the internet or your AV programs, while in safe mode.
- It prevents you from formatting your hard drive and reinstalling windows.
- The linked website is a hoax to get you to pay for their fake AV protection.
- A supposed "tech support guy," on a phone malware removal team said it would cost $99 to have a technician get around the virus and fix it for me (I suspect even having live tech support may be part of the hoax.)

I eventually got rid of it by intentionally corrupting my copy of windows, in which then I could reformat my hard drive, and have spent the last 8hrs reinstalling shit.

Thank god I had everything saved on an external, that WASN'T plugged in at the time the virus hit.

While trying to remove the virus I stumbled across some of its coding. I know a slight amount of programing, or at least enough to tell this was a very, very sophisticated virus.

I have no idea where it came from either, leading me to believe it may have been an activeX attack, or perhaps through Java. I honestly don't know. It popped up when I went to Google.

[Aussie]

I've gotten a fake anti-virus about two/three times.

I think all I had to do for the last one was do a System Restore. Wasn't too much trouble at all. D:

[X-Trav]

XP Security 2012,

Windows XP is a virus in itself.

Glad you managed to keep your files!

[Navron]

I've gotten a fake anti-virus about two/three times.

I think all I had to do for the last one was do a System Restore. Wasn't too much trouble at all. D:

Same here, which is why this time I was simply doing all I've done before. Don't click anything, close the process/s, run AV software, restart in safe mode, run AV again, double check startup processes, restart normally.

This one was off the wall because even if you closed every single process, something was still restarting it. Even in safe mode, when it's the bare minimum required system processes, something was still triggering the processes every 30sec, and something else was blocking all computer programs from running. IN FREAKIN SAFE MODE!

[bartekko]

XP Security 2012,

Windows XP is a virus in itself.

did you mean "Windows Vista" ?

[Tephnos]

That is one hard core virus.

Although I haven't been infected by one in about 4/5 years. Any time I actually got one was me playing the chance game and clicking on something I knew was sketchy.

[Mundius]

That is one hard core virus.

That's one of the most sophisticated viruses that I've seen. This virus is probably worth millions on the black market.

Luckily, I don't have it and my database is updated. Thanks for the warning.