DOS AGOBOT. HM non cleanable

[Melodi]

After following the instructions in this thread
http://forums.techguy.org/t220791.html and finally finding and deleting netscvs.exe then running housecall.microtrend.com the scan came up with DOS_AGOBOT.HM non cleanable. Houscall says it's an infected file in
C:Windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

Anyone have a suggestion to get rid of this? Is this what is preventing the symantec sites from coming up? Norton cannot run live update because it cannot connect to symantec and I cannot bring symatec up either, not by typing it in nor by clicking on links provided by google (or any other search engine). Nothing symantec will come up. I can access the rest of the internet fine.

Windows XP home, all critical updates are current.

 

[funky_munky]

Try rebooting into safe mode Melodi and navigate to that folder through windows explorer then delete the entire contents of the hosts file.

 

[Melodi]

There is hosts and Imhosts. Delete all or just hosts?

 

[Flrman1]

Melodi,

I got your PM. What OS is the machine running? We can just replace the host file with a new one, but I need to know the OS to get the right one.

 

[Melodi]

Oh crumbs. I just deleted it, the hosts one. It's windows xp home

 

[Flrman1]

That's OK. Replace it with this one:

http://www.accs-net.com/hosts/Downloads/hosts127001.zip

I don't know what I was thinking this hosts file will work on all Windows versions! DUHH!

 

[Melodi]

Thanks guys, it's able to access symantec once again. I have a few questions (as I always do) Is that the sole purpose of that virus to keep people out of symantec? How does one prevent reinfection (it's not my pc, so I want to maybe explain to the owner how to prevent it) and prior to housecall, I ran Panda and that didn't pick anything up, it said it was virus free. If I had not run housecall, I don't think I would have found it. Thanks again!!

Floorman your link worked great and um...it's hard for me to remember yesterday much less what host file will work where and when , so I would say you are doing pretty good

 

[Flrman1]

Keep up to date on the virus definitions. Do regular full sytem virus scans.

Also I highly recommend that you go to Windows update and install all "Critical Updates and Service Packs". This will patch numerous security holes in IE and Windows.

 

[Meangean]

fix these

R1 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Search Bar = http://srch-us4.hpwis.com/
R0 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Start Page = http://us4.hpwis.com/
R1 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Page_URL = http://us4.hpwis.com/
R1 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Search_URL = http://srch-us4.hpwis.com/
R0 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Start Page = http://us4.hpwis.com/
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Search Bar = http://srch-us4.hpwis.com/