Avast recommend I remove some some add ons that I had slipped through my “untick the box” net!
It was mysearchdial in Firefox and some other searchdial bits.
It has wrecked the installation of several programs. Firefox will not uninstall but will not run either.
Some apps work others fail to start with various problems.
I think I need to rebuild my system and reinstall everything.
Has anyone else experienced this?
To my shame I remember noticing a tick “helper” box just as I downloaded a driver tool as I was rebuilding a friends machine. I do feel stupid!
I loaded malwarebytes and it has quarantined some objects. Microsoft Office 2007 seems to have repaired itself by an install on the elements starting.
Firefox repaired itself by an install.
MS VB 2010 is still busted. Bits start but it doesnt work.
Aquia Drupal Desktop is bust.
Dreamweaver is requesting an uninstall and reinstall.
Other programs yet to check out.
Several days unhappy work to do!
Of course I have files backed up but I have no “image” to reinstall.
It does not look like this is a trojan or anything really nasty, just a browser hijack.
A moments inattention is going to cost me a lot of hours! I just hope my development toys can all be rebuilt ok.
When I reported this it looked like a really bad virus or worm.
I know technically its neither but it still wrecked my PC installation and it was triggered by an Avast process running. I have always trusted Avast but this has caused major problems.
This is a “flag” to others to avoid a really serious issues and not a request for “removal support”.
Users don’t really care whether the process was a technically a virus, malware, trojan or some other technical definition. They would prefer the Avast team to be alerted to a real issue and think about how to stop it happening to others.
Just to finish this thread. The add-on removal process went through my C drive deleting any mySQL databases it found. Also it has destroyed the uninstall process for most programs so I can’t do a clean re-install.
The Avast add-on removal process either triggered a vicious attack by something on my PC or was fooled into trashing my PC.
It looks like I will only be able to trust a clean rebuild of everything.
But hey don’t worry this wasn’t a virus or worm! It was my failure to spot a dodgy check box on a dodgy site. So no one else needs to worry.
I hope my backups were not affected. They were online when this havoc was enacted!