Internet Explorer and Windows Update Site

[em21]

My computer got infected last night. One of the results was that I could not
access IE and all my security applications including Windows Security Center
got dissabled. I could access AOL and Firefox OK. We the help of a Gateway
tech I was able to get IE working. We redownloaded Malwawrebytes and run it
several times. We redownloaded AVG and run a full scan. We found a whole
bunch of Trojans, Rootkits, and Rogues. I also downloaded Spybot and run that
too.

My system is working now, except that I can not access the Windows Update
Website. I don't know if there is something wrong with the site, or there is
something blocking it. I need to know if my Windows Updates is working.

Can anybody give some suggestions on what to do about this? Is there some
run around I could do to access the site? I already tried resetting IE, but
that changed nothing.

My next question is, if there is nothing I can do about that, will it hurt
anything if I uninstall and reinstall IE? I mean, will any important files
will get lost with uninstalling? I installed IE7 after installing Windows
SP3, so uninstalling and reinstalling is an option without having to
reinstall SP3. That would be my last option before having to format my system.

I have Windows XP/SP3, IE 7, AOL 9.0 SE, Mozilla Firefox, AVG 9.0 Free,
Malwarebytes, Spybot, Ccleaner (I keep up with my Windows Updates, and all
the security applications are updated).

Can anybody help please, I don't want to have to format again. I just had to
do that recently.

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

What anti-virus application was installed when the computer got infected
(i.e., before you attempted to install AVG) and was your subscription still
current?

Has a(another) Norton or McAfee application ever been installed on the
computer (e.g., a free-trial version that came preinstalled when you bought
it)?

 

[Twayne]

In

My computer got infected last night. One of the results was
that I could not access IE and all my security applications
including Windows Security Center got dissabled. I could
access AOL and Firefox OK. We the help of a Gateway tech I
was able to get IE working. We redownloaded Malwawrebytes
and run it several times. We redownloaded AVG and run a
full scan. We found a whole bunch of Trojans, Rootkits,
and Rogues. I also downloaded Spybot and run that too.

My system is working now, except that I can not access the
Windows Update Website. I don't know if there is something
wrong with the site, or there is something blocking it. I
need to know if my Windows Updates is working.

Can anybody give some suggestions on what to do about this?
Is there some
run around I could do to access the site? I already tried
resetting IE, but that changed nothing.

My next question is, if there is nothing I can do about
that, will it hurt anything if I uninstall and reinstall
IE? I mean, will any important files will get lost with
uninstalling? I installed IE7 after installing Windows SP3,
so uninstalling and reinstalling is an option without
having to reinstall SP3. That would be my last option
before having to format my system.

I have Windows XP/SP3, IE 7, AOL 9.0 SE, Mozilla Firefox,
AVG 9.0 Free, Malwarebytes, Spybot, Ccleaner (I keep up
with my Windows Updates, and all the security applications
are updated).

Can anybody help please, I don't want to have to format
again. I just had to do that recently.

You likely still have a piece of malware left over. Rerun all of your
spyware scanners to see what else they find. Sometimes it takes more than
one run to get everything located.
It won't hurt anything to uninstall/reinstall IE8; in fact, it might be
worth a try. Do the malware scans first, though. Wouldn't hurt to rerun
virus scan, too.

HTH,

Twayne`

 

[em21]

Thank you Pa Bear and Twyne for your responses, and sorry I a took so long to
respond.

What happened is that I ended up having to reformat my computer, (this
happened before I got your responses) and was occupied with this for a few
days. I tried to get in here last night, but the site wasn't working, so I
had to wait till today.

Pa Bear, I had AVG Free, but the virus had dissabled it. I uninstalled and
reinstalled it. And yes, the subscsription was still current. I had McAfee
long time ago, but I uninstalled it, and removed every trace of it before I
first installed AVG Free.

Twaine, I guess I still must have had something in my computer. I figured
there was nothing wrong with IE, but that the virus was blocking access to
Windows Update. I worked scanning with Malwarebytes, Spybot, and AVG various
times, and also worked at repairing various damaged applications, and still
was having problems. After trying every possibility with no success, I
decided to Format.

I will keep your suggestions in mind in case I have this problem again.

Thanks,

 

[Twayne]

In

Thank you Pa Bear and Twyne for your responses, and sorry I
a took so long to respond.

What happened is that I ended up having to reformat my
computer, (this happened before I got your responses) and
was occupied with this for a few days. I tried to get in
here last night, but the site wasn't working, so I had to
wait till today.

Pa Bear, I had AVG Free, but the virus had dissabled it. I
uninstalled and reinstalled it. And yes, the subscsription
was still current. I had McAfee long time ago, but I
uninstalled it, and removed every trace of it before I
first installed AVG Free.

Twaine, I guess I still must have had something in my
computer. I figured there was nothing wrong with IE, but
that the virus was blocking access to Windows Update. I
worked scanning with Malwarebytes, Spybot, and AVG various
times, and also worked at repairing various damaged
applications, and still was having problems. After trying
every possibility with no success, I decided to Format.

I will keep your suggestions in mind in case I have this
problem again.

Thanks,

Well, that should at least give you a clean start, annoying as the process
was.

Unasked for advice: You might wish to consider the following since this wont
be the last time you manually rebuild your system:

For the future you might like to investigate and invest in Norton Ghost or
Acronis True Image (norton.com and acronis.com). They're excellent for
creating disk images and with the ISO file burned to a disc, that comes with
them, can re-recreate a boot disk quickly. I have a fairly large OS install
and it took 23 minutes, including finding and booting from the ISO sourced
disk last time to be back to the previous night's state. ISO is like a
compressed disk; just needs to be uncompressed by the burning ware.

Even windows ntbackup.exe is a good tool, just sans all the bells & whistles
that's all. For a full boot disk recover it insists on a floppy drive,
though (ASR floppy). Help has a decent description of it.