Virus Chest

Viruses and worms
1

I am new to this whole process. But, I may be proceeding wrong and, as a newbie, I want to know whether I am being too “confident” that - once a worm/trojan/virus is detected and placed into the chest, my computer is safe.

Consider this morning’s event. I got notification from AVAST mail scanner that I had received a ZIP PSW worm. I immediately placed it into the chest and am running a full-system scan.

After that is complete, I will run a boot-time scan.

However, when reading this forum, it appears that you folk attempt to further remove the offending file.

Since this particular worm is not listed on your cleaner - I don’t know whether or not I should attempt to remove it. I am looking for some sound advice here. IF IT IS IN THE CHEST CAN IT AFFECT MY COMPUTER? And, since it was caught BEFORE it was opened, is my computer in any danger?

I periodically have to wipe my hard drive. Since I don’t have a memory “stick,” this process is tedious. I am a writer and do not want to lose my current “version” of my pieces, nor do I want to lose my current emails or work documents. Yet, something seems to want to “USE” my computer - and, I have come to believe that something is attached to one of my picture files. YES, I collect lovely pictures from Google Images and very often run a series in my “nature” or other kinds of files, as a screensaver.

Thus, I will be careful this time, about which pictures I re-load onto my computer. (Oh yeah, IS there a way to scan pictures you are about to save?)

Ok guys, that’s about it. MAIN QUESTION: Is my computer safe when the potential virus was placed into a chest unopened from email? (the mail came from noreply@qwest.net - qwest is my provider)

SECOND QUESTION: Do I need to take steps to rid the chest of this worm?

THIRD QUESTION: Is there a way to scan pictures before saving them to file?

Any comments you can provide will be gratefully received.

2
once a worm/trojan/virus is detected and placed into the chest, my computer is safe.
Yes, it is safe
Since this particular worm is not listed on your cleaner
If Avast is able to detect it, it is in th vps list.
I periodically have to wipe my hard drive.
Why?
Is there a way to scan pictures before saving them to file?
A image = a file. This Q doesn't make much sense. Please elaborate.
3

Why do I have to wipe my hard drive? After re-loading my backup files, I experience a slow system crash. Although it does not occur when I download “My Documents” - it DOES occur when I re-load “My Pictures”.

You have to understand that I have over 2000 pictures. They are my repose from a hard day’s work and I have searched and saved images for over two years. Between the fractal art, the pictures of classics, my nature and landscape pictures, my animal and comic pictures, (I even have etchings from Japan - lovely)…my file of pictures is quite extensive.

Yet, it appears there is SOMETHING attached to one of my beloved files that likes to cause havoc. If I leave the situation unattended for a couple of months, I am soon receiving notices that “email you sent is undeliverable”…and, these notices are of email sent to people I do not know! Thus, I believe that one of the “attachments” on the back-side of one or more pictures contains a back-door element that allows them control of my computer. At that point, my Zone Alarm settings will be re-set - and, all sorts of “STRANGE” things happen. Icons disappear from my desktop (their Icon being replaced by the generic “we don’t know which program runs this application” image…and, when I click on them, the application will no longer open.

I don’t fight it. I simply wipe my hard drive. ANSWER? Don’t reload any pictures, except family pics that I know to be safe.

To answer the person who said - “expound” -

I have never been able to fully comprehend just HOW the antivirus application works. I was hit hard during my first year on this computer and, since I had never owned a computer before, I floundered around until I found solutions that worked. Avast was one of these. But, I don’t understand the difference between putting a file into a chest and deleting it when the pop-up comes up and tells me there is a problem.

I don’t understand how to rid myself of a trojan or back-door user, when nothing warns me of its presence!

So - call me naive - because I am certainly not unwilling to learn - I had a computer that was compromised because it was a display unit that no one had taken the “display inhibitors” off of when we bought it - and we were nearly a YEAR in finding out that that was the reason we kept getting kicked off the internet and our anti-virus program.

Since then, we discovered the ram and hard drive were bad - and these were replaced because we were under warranty. I got rid of the HP configuration and went to a straight HP - but, still have problems from time to time with disappearing icons and troublesome running of my computer - Internet Explorer experienced a fatal error just prior to my last “wipe” and, I could not get it to function, even after re-loading the program from the IE file a friend sent to me via Yahoo. It was strange, I could get Yahoo and email - but not Explorer. SOMETHING had happened, and I had no warning that my computer had a trojan/backdoor user OR virus or worm. To this day, I do not know what program would have helped me prevent this situation, since the culprit was not caught by Avast, Adaware, Spybot or SpywareGuard.

Ok - I’m done. Thanks for letting me know that, once placed in the chest my computer is safe.

ANOTHER QUESTION: Should I always keep the original email in a file, or is it safe to now delete it and or use “Eraser” to erase it?

4

Correction - I got rid of HP and went to straight XP