Help! My Internet Explorer and OE have crashed!

[kimmybgood]

First, I couldn't bring up my e-mail in Outlook Express. The subject line would show, but when I'd click on it, there would be an empty window. THEN, IE 6 would just stop coming up. I keep getting a message that says, "Microsoft Internet Explorer has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience. If you were in the middle of something, the information you were working on might be lost." It then has a checked square that says, "Restart Microsoft Internet Explorer." I tried removing IE 6 and then reinstalling, but nothing has changed. I can no longer bring up OE, either. AND, since IE seems to be so intertwined in so many Windows processes, I can't do much of anything. I can't download anything. I can't add/remove anything. Thank god, I had just downloaded this MyIE2 browser (i don't think that did anything) because at least I can surf the web. But I am just sick! I've been inundated with numerous trojan horse viruses in the past week or two weeks. I have the free version of AVG and it supposedly "healed" the infected files.

Please help!

I have Windows 2000 Professional, AVG, and what else do you need to know?

Rgds,
Kim

 

[mobo]

http://support.earthlink.net/mu/1/psc/img/walkthroughs/windows_9x_nt/browsers/ie_6.0/8458.psc.html

 

[rude]

It's the old prevention or cure thing-AVG is used to heal an infection,A FIREWALL is used to prevent infection in the first place.

The FIRST thing you need to do is ensure that you have installed ALL Microsoft Updates.

SECOND:This is an ABSOLUTE PRIORITY,get a good firewall,read it's documentation so you know how to set it up and make sure it starts on bootup.

An excellent FREE firewall,called ZoneAlarm,can be found here:
http://www.uant.net/firewall/zonealarmguide.html

THIRD:Another ABSOLUTE PRIORITY is to get a good Antivirus program(which you already have) and AVG is as good as it gets.

(I use these 2 programs on my machine and have had no virus,trojan,worm or browser hijacking in over a year)

FOURTH:Before running ANY scan for virus,trojan,worm etc. you should ALWAYS turn off System Restore as copies of everything you are trying to get rid of are in System Restore just waiting for you to put them back where they came from in the first place.

This will delete all restore points on your machine,but if they are infected you don't want them anyway.

FIFTH:Another good thing to do before running the scans is to clear out your TIF and other temp files.
In Internet Options, under the General tab click the Delete temporary internet files, choose to delete all Offline content.
Also, go to Start - Search - Files or folders - in the "All or part of the file name" box, type: *.tmp and choose Edit - select all - File - delete.
Do the same for "Cookies"

Empty the contents of the C:\Windows\temp folder and C:\temp folder, if you have one.
Empty Recycle bin.

SIXTH:Now you are ready to scan your system using:

Spybot Search & Destroy is a free program that does a good job and can be found here:http://www.safer-networking.org/index.php?page=download

Another thing you can do is an online system scan from here: http://housecall.antivirus.com/housecall/start_corp.asp

Make sure that you update antivirus,firewall and scanning programs on a regular basis,and particularly,just before performing a system scan.

Once you have cleaned your system and have it running the way it should,turn System Restore back on and create a fresh,clean restore point.

(Bet you thought you wouldn't have any fun here...didn't you?)