Do I have a virus, I really cant tell?

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 20:55

Ok. so it all started a couple weeks ago.

I was trying to get an old game i played as a kid and not wanting to pay for it again, i attempted to find it for free.

i went to thousands of dodgy websites none of which i trusted enough to continue browsing.

Frustrated, I downloaded it from softonic or similar, in the hope that i would just decline anything i was tricked into installing.

This seemed to work, although i found my browsers search had been changed to conduit and I had "highlight adds", if that's what they're called (basically the ones that highlight a word then give you an ominous add when you mouse over them)

At first this was fine, because i simply changed my search back too google, and uninstalled "Search Donkey", the program i determined to be causing these adds.

All seemed to be normal. However, the system tray icon remains. I cannot find any other trace of "Search Donkey" on my computer and it doesn't show up in "the uninstall a program" panel.

"Search Donkey" Seems to be doing absolutely nothing, but the system tray icon seem strange, and is there consistently.

As well as this, I've noticed adds cropping up in strange places. not chrome since i have AddBlock, but most noticeably Skype. I don't know if this is an actual thing Skype have introduced, but I've noticed a large banner supplied by "add choices". Although i don't have a problem with add choices (they seem to supply a lot of innocent banners to a lot of innocent sites) I just find it strange that its in Skype. It definitely wasn't there before.

Im running win 7 home premium.
I don't have any AV, because, up until now i have simply trusted myself, and i have had bad experiences with AVG and macafee that kinda put me of the whole AV scene.

Beerbaron · 30 Jan 2014 at 20:57

Install an AV and Malwarebytes. Run both.

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 20:58

Can you recomend one. I am actually quite scared of AV

RJC · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:00

I use Microsoft Security essentials and not had any issues.

Also use Malware Bytes which is good.

Beerbaron · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:00

Microsoft Security Essentials as its free.

KIA · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:02

Malwarebytes in safe-mode. Don't forget to update the definitions before doing a full system scan.

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:03

its not gonna give me popups or crash all my games when it updates, right?

RJC · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:04

I have not had any issues.

UnworthyBean · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:06

Lemonade1947 said:
its not gonna give me popups or crash all my games when it updates, right?

Security essentials is probably the best for this, It just runs silently in the background and updates with Windows.

Malwarebytes is an on demand scanner, so it doesn't run all the time.

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:08

they are both currently scanning. Would they pick up stuff like "ask toolbar" as though it was a virus? because that would be real handy.

RJC · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:11

Let them run and see what they pick up, also double check the uninstall programs tab in control panel and see if you see it anything in there.

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:13

Unless its there under a different name, it really isn't there, ive searched for it and everything.

Lemonade1947 · 30 Jan 2014 at 21:13

I just finnished scanning, and found a whole lot of bulkware. thanks a whole bunch for all your help.

KIA · 31 Jan 2014 at 11:31

Lemonade1947 said:
they are both currently scanning. Would they pick up stuff like "ask toolbar" as though it was a virus? because that would be real handy.

Some stuff might show up as 'potentially unwanted program'.

Rainmaker · 31 Jan 2014 at 12:21

Sorry but MSE isn't going to detect, much less remove, something like Conduit. Even MBAM doesn't usually get it all either, unfortunately. Download Tiranium Cloud Antivirus and run it - it's a standalone cloud scanner, not a resident AV. It consistently has the best 0day and PUP detection by far.

Then download ADWCleaner and run that. Watch Conduit die.

You should ensure you have uninstalled any browser extensions (Chrome, Firefox, Opera, IE etc) and the tool will get rid of any hidden services, exe files etc which are the cause of Conduit reinfecting the system.