Ok. The only "changes" that I have made, have been what YOU have instructed for me to do with the one exception of the zone alarm which was on the page that you sent me to in a previous post. That has been the only thing that I have installed, so I am completely lost with what independent changes you are talking about being made? I have no idea what or where mywebsearch came from but I will remove it. So am I still infected, or am I clear and will the spyware and firewall I have now keep me safe? Thanks for you help.
When it comes to computer repairs Cammy one place to look for errors is the user, so at my end of this thread that user is me. Not sure where I saw the difference I mentioned earlier, and as for MyWebSearch the entries have actually shown already as only these orphaned startup listings so they can be corrected now.
Close Internet Explorer and all running programs and run a scan in HijackThis. Place a check next to all of the following lines, then select “Fix Checked” and close HijackThis.
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [MyWebSearch Email Plugin] C:\PROGRA~1\MYWEBS~1\bar\1.bin\mwsoemon.exe
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [My Web Search Bar Search Scope Monitor] "C:\PROGRA~1\MYWEBS~1\bar\1.bin\m3SrchMn.exe" /m=2 /w
Then looking at the log you just posted I see the following listed items, either as startups or actual running processes. the goal here would be to have a good antivirus software, antispyware software and a firewall. Those alone, if updated and used/maintained regularly along with some guideline info like Tony Klein's here would do nicely.
So we have:
Possible antivirus startups - Zone Alarm and McAfee and AOL Antivirus
Possible Firewall - McAfee and Zone Alarm
Anti-spyware/Anti-adware - Ad-Aware and SpyBot (at least the BHO blocker)
So looking at that list you set me straight on what is actually installed and for what use. ZA and McAfee and AOL all show here as running processes (started in some fashion), with the idea to trim this down to avoid any protection overlaps/conflicts.
We never did move forward on the IE shortcut. If you right click the desktop and select Properties - Desktop tab, then click the Customize Desktop button. Uncheck Desktop Icons -> Internet Explorer (then OK/Apply/OK to close). Leave this, and after the next reboot repeat those steps but now recheck the Internet Explorer icon, and see if the settings are corrected.
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