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Cleaning up after Anti-Viruses
Nikhil Rastogi, Jun 01, 2008 1220 hrs ISTAnti-Virus programs do catch the culprits and remove them -- but what happens in the aftermath?
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After-Virus Blues
If you've noticed that your computer is acting funny or weird things are happening after the virus scan. This is where troubleshooting "After-Virus Blues" starts. The virus is gone but not it's left-overs.
1. You are at the safe stage where there is no active virus therefore no threat; however, its annoying left-overs are still present. First and foremost check to see your Anti-Virus program's quarantine section for the virus name.
2. Knowing the name of the virus will help to disinfect the computer completely. This is where Google is your friend; just type in the name of the virus or its symptom that you are experiencing and you are sure to get an answer and that too from the Anti-Virus vendors themselves. In fact, you can search the site of the Anti-Virus program that you are using itself, look into the "Virus Encyclopaedia" section. This has the added advantage of sure-shot finding the info that you need as Anti-Virus vendors assign different names to the same virus sometimes, yes the name is not (always) decided by the virus creator but by the Anti-Virus companies themselves.
3. Here's where cleaning an infection can get dirty. Almost always viruses/spyware modify registry entries that you need to painstakingly cleanup, disable any startup entries and remove any files left behind which the Anti-Virus hasn't picked up. All that I can say is follow the instructions to the tee to clean up.
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