I actually ran across that site when I was try to run this down for you and
it was one of the reasons I made this suggestion. When a lot of people are
suddenly experiencing the same issue a virus is the first thing to suspect.
I had no way of knowing you had already done so nor from your original post
did I have any idea of what you had already done.
Regardless of virus scans run by others, I still felt it was a good first
approach as one of the next steps is to possibly modify the registry. I'd
prefer not to start with that.
If this is a relatively recent issue, the next thing to try would be a
System Restore back to a time prior to when this began. It only restores
the system state and settings. Start\All Programs\Accessories\System
Tools\System Restore
If that fails, the following assumes you have an actual XP CD as opposed to
a restore CD or
restore partition supplied by your PC manufacturer.
Go to Start, type sfc /scannow in the run box and press enter. Note, there
is a space between sfc and the forward slash. You will be asked for your XP
CD. Be aware, upon inserting the CD the XP setup screen may appear, this is
not a part of sfc /scannow, rather it is being invoked by autorun. Simply
minimize the screen and allow sfc to continue.
If that fails, here's something I found on Google from Shain Wray of the
Microsoft PSS Security team:
It is possible that the registry ACL for the key Lsa may not be set to the
default.
The default ACL for the key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa
is:
Administrators Read & Full Control
Authenticated Users Read
CREATOR OWNER (*SPECIAL*) Full Control to Subkeys only
Server Operators Read
SYSTEM Read & Full Control
Before attempting the above, I'd suggest exporting the registry key by right
clicking the key and selecting export in case you need to bring it back into
the registry. NOTE: you access the registry by going to Start and typing
regedit in the run box.
You should also make sure your data is backed up as well.
