Suspect... is my avast been disabled by a virus or script ?

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

Hello ,
I am running Avast 4 home (uptodate) on my XP SP2 system.

A few days ago i was visiting a suspicious website and avast crashed… since that moment i cannot see anymore the avast icons in the tray icon and strangely outlook viruses popups didn’t shows up anymore.
Avast is still installed and i performed a full system scan with no results.

I used today the little application suggested in this forum to externally control avast and, making a “restart avast protection” it showed up the icons again…

So, i guess that the avast protection was disabled by something and when my windows starts it is not starting automatically (what a damage).

What should i do ? Is there any registry key where you set avast protection to start with your computer ?

I am pretty scared…

Thank you

2

Does avast! start normally when you restart PC? I doubt that one crash could totally disable avast!..

3

The first thing is to make sure your computer is clean. Run the online scan from Trend Micro called Housecall http://housecall.trendmicro.com this is a free scan and should help put your mind at ease.

4

How was it suspicious? if you knew it to be suspicious why did you visit it?

How do you know avast crashed and not just the ashDisp.exe icon? did you check the Windows Task Manager, was ashServ.exe or any of the other providers running? A simple reboot may wel have restored things to normal as RejZor mentioned (the person who made the AEC tool you used).

Using the Windows Run (from the Start button), type msconfig, when the new window opens check the Startup Tab you should see the programs that Run on Start-up, ashDisp should be listed and ticked.

5

OK, this is the actual situation:

  1. If i restart the avast protection with the tool i downloaded following your link the icons reappears and i block viruses in my email.

  2. When i restart my machine, i still have NO ICONS and seems no protection.

I tried to run a full system scan (before windows starts) with absolutely no results…

I am becoming even more scared…

Anyone can help ^

6

Have you tried a repair of avast? Go to “Add/Remove programs”, select avast, press “uninstall” and then you will be given a choice to Repair it.

edit: you must be on-line to do this.

7

You don’t happen to have a program called spysweeper do you? Some time ago it was responsible for falsely identifying and deleting the entry for the icons.

Have you or did you have an AV installed on this PC, if so which one and how did you get rid of it?

Did you check if ashDisp was in the startup tab as I suggested?
We ask questions to try and help you/us to pin down the problem or offer a suggestion, if you don’t answer we are left to guess.

If all else fails try, uninstall avast, reboot, install, reboot.