You may or may not be able to fully eradicate an infection by yourself depending on the type of infection, how long it has been in your system, your understanding of what is happening in the background, etc. However, there are always steps you can take to move toward cleaning up your computer. These instructions are primarily for PC systems. In the Download section, at the top, there is an antivirus program and an antimalware program for the Mac.
- Norton NPE - Click and save this file to your desktop, or run it from here. This will check for an updated version, then it will restart your computer to begin a rootkit scan, among other scans as well. It searches for very specific infection types.
- Ccleaner - Download and install this tool, then restart your computer before you run Ccleaner to purge excess files & file areas that potentially harvest malware and low-level infections. This will also remove temp files and speed up the process of any antivirus scans.
- AVG / Avast - Most computers already have Windows Defender or some other antivirus program installed. If you don't have current antivirus software, install one of these and run a full scan when done; otherwise, update the software you do have and run a full scan. Remember, you should not install multiple antivirus programs on one computer. You can have multiple antimalware programs, however.
- MalwareBytes - Install this, update it, then scan for malware. Remove anything it finds. Alternatively, or in conjunction with MalwareBytes, you can download & install Spybot and run the Microsoft Safety Scanner. Spybot is excellent, but it will appropriately disable Windows Defender.
- Firefox / Chrome - Install any of these if Internet Explorer isn't working properly. Also, if your computer has been infected, you may need to wipe out the settings of your browser completely so as to remove infectious elements called “add-ins”.
Still having issues? Contact me directly, or fill out the Support Request here.