[4dsmom]

I was away from my PC today (Connected to DSL) and when I came back to it, AVG had a warning I was infected with Trojan Horse Backdoor.Generic10.FQL in a screensaver, one I may add that was on my hard drive but not the one in use.I have not downloaded any screensavers in months so it was not a new one. I immediately had the virus moved to the vault and deleted it. I then ran a complete scan of my PC and it found the same virus in 2 more screensavers that are in system32 folder and i386 folder. All four files were infected with this virus.
I can find no information on this virus on the web. And I do not understand how they became infected. Can anyone enlighten me?

[Byteman]

Hi,

Probably you have upgraded to the new AVG 8 and had Ver. 7.5?

Or, you changed antivirus programs recently? We've been seeing AVG 8 put up a lot of false positives, because the new version detects differently, even on the same system and same files, even if you had AVG lower version and scanned with everything before, the new program can often produce false detections that scare the heck out of you

Although free downloaded screensavers are famous for containing malware, not all of them do by a long shot.


You probably should not delete the files *any* security program finds or alerts you about....quarantining is enough as they are locked up there and cannot do any harm. Lots of these new "alerts" especially by newer versions of the same program you had been using...in this case AVG- are often false positives


I said sometimes....not always. If you still have any copies, in the Virus Vault etc....you can scan just one file at a time (takes just seconds) here:

http://www.virustotal.com/

or, here: > http://virusscan.jotti.org/

or, here: http://www.kaspersky.com/scanforvirus


Keep those Links in your Favorites, for NEXT time this happens....you or someone is very apt to quarantine, and/or then Delete, a needed file at some point. You do not need to do this.

[4dsmom]

Thanks so much, I couldn't figure out HOW it could detect a virus when the "questionable files" were not running and had been on my hard drive for well over a year.
You are right I had upgraded to Avg 8 but that was when it was first released. Wonder why it's just now detecting something. I run regular scans and have several spyware programs in use, and nothing has come up with any problems. I certainly will follow your advice and quarantine them and do a furthur scan from there. I just lost 3 good screensavers because of this. Guess I trust AVG to much.
Thanks Again

[Byteman]

Hi,

You are very welcome- like I posted, you can scan any file you (or AVG or any software) have doubts about very quickly at one of those links in my other Reply. Have a good one!

[Byteman]

Hi,

You are very welcome- like I posted, you can scan any file you (or AVG or any software) have doubts about very quickly at one of those links in my other Reply.

Originally Posted by 4dsmom

I just lost 3 good screensavers because of this. Guess I trust AVG to much.
Thanks Again

Well, do you know where you got them? Go and re-download them.

Tell AVG, or whatever program alerts about them to IGNORE the file, provided of course you SCAN them first at one of the one-file-at-a-time sites I posted.


Have a good one!

[4dsmom]

I sent the latest files that were "threats" to one of the sites you suggested, and it was clean. I disabled resident sheild, because that is what is finding all these "threats". Thanks again

[Byteman]

Whoa! Doing that gives you no protection at all....from anything REAL

You need an antivirus program working.

Once you click "Ignore" on a file that AVG alerts about it should not bother you again....

On mine, it found only a couple of "threats" which I knew were not malware, so I chose Ignore.

AVG 8 did this only the first day I had it, for about 3 files....some of which, are parts of the HP computer, files that to an antivirus program slightly resemble malware....but, false positives can be almost anything.

You must use the antivirus program with it's Resident Shield "Enabled", or it's like not having

any A/V installed.

[4dsmom]

Dear Byteman
Thanks, I didn't realize I was jeopardizing everything by disabling resident sheild. it is now enabled and I will follow your advice. Thank you so very much.