sms.exe and crss.exe question

[Guest]

I had a virus on my PC a week ago. After numerous conversation with Norton
virus removal support and many instructions followed they told me the virus
was gone. However I still have the intial symptoms. In the course of the
support norton told me to delete the windows system files smss.exe and
crss.exe. A later chat with a norton operative informed me that these are
windows files and need for correct operation. They then told me to contact my
PC manufacturer and repair the windows installation. I have tried to repair
it but the setup procedure stalls at the point where Setup asks to press
ENTER to set up Windows, R to repair or F3 to exit. The screen says up but no
furtehr action takes place.

Can anyone advise me on a route round this problem.

 

[David H. Lipman]

From: "Alan M" <[email protected]>

| I had a virus on my PC a week ago. After numerous conversation with Norton
| virus removal support and many instructions followed they told me the virus
| was gone. However I still have the intial symptoms. In the course of the
| support norton told me to delete the windows system files smss.exe and
| crss.exe. A later chat with a norton operative informed me that these are
| windows files and need for correct operation. They then told me to contact my
| PC manufacturer and repair the windows installation. I have tried to repair
| it but the setup procedure stalls at the point where Setup asks to press
| ENTER to set up Windows, R to repair or F3 to exit. The screen says up but no
| furtehr action takes place.
|
| Can anyone advise me on a route round this problem.

There are anti virus News Groups specifically for this type of discussion.

microsoft.public.security.virus
alt.comp.virus
alt.comp.anti-virus

Those file names are legitimate. However, there are infectors that use those names. They
just don't execute from the real location of the legitimate files %windir%\system32. So if
they are executed from some other location, it is a sure sign of malware.



For non-viral malware...

Please download, install and update the following software...

* Ad-aware SE v1.06
http://www.lavasoft.de/
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/

* SpyBot Search and Destroy v1.4
http://security.kolla.de/

After the software is updated, I suggest scanning the system in Safe Mode.

I also suggest downloading, installing and updating BHODemon for any Browser Helper Objects
that may be on the PC.

* BHODemon

http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloadget.php?id=3550&file=11&evp=245a87539eea8ed6904332b4b8b8442d

For viral malware...

* Download MULTI_AV.EXE from the URL --
http://www.ik-cs.com/programs/virtools/Multi_AV.exe

To use this utility, perform the following...
Execute; Multi_AV.exe { Note: You must use the default folder C:\AV-CLS }
Choose; Unzip
Choose; Close

Execute; C:\AV-CLS\StartMenu.BAT
{ or Double-click on 'Start Menu' in C:\AV-CLS }

NOTE: You may have to disable your software FireWall or allow WGET.EXE to go through your
FireWall to allow it to download the needed AV vendor related files.

C:\AV-CLS\StartMenu.BAT -- { or Double-click on 'Start Menu' in C:\AV-CLS}
This will bring up the initial menu of choices and should be executed in Normal Mode.
This way all the components can be downloaded from each AV vendor's web site.
The choices are; Sophos, Trend, McAfee, Kaspersky, Exit this menu and Reboot the PC.

You can choose to go to each menu item and just download the needed files or you can
download the files and perform a scan in Normal Mode. Once you have downloaded the files
needed for each scanner you want to use, you should reboot the PC into Safe Mode [F8 key
during boot] and re-run the menu again and choose which scanner you want to run in Safe
Mode. It is suggested to run the scanners in both Safe Mode and Normal Mode.

When the menu is displayed hitting 'H' or 'h' will bring up a more comprehensive PDF help
file. http://www.ik-cs.com/multi-av.htm


* * * Please report back your results * * *

 

[Guest]

Real problems I am afraid.


Downloaded the SpyBot Search and Destroy programme. Could not seach for
updates . The log file says file could not be downloaded due to bad checksum.
Don't know what that means. The check for errors menu option will ot work as
it says I need to install detection updates using the integrated
update....which as I just said will not work. Clicking search for updates
returnd the error message ' Error retrieiving info file. Socket error #1104'


Downloaded Multi_AVe.exe.

Ran the menu.bat choosing any of the options 1 to 4 returns an error:

c::AV-cls\trend\Pattern.txt not opened for read, error code :[0]


Looks bad eh?

From: "Alan M" <[email protected]>

| I had a virus on my PC a week ago. After numerous conversation with Norton
| virus removal support and many instructions followed they told me the virus
| was gone. However I still have the intial symptoms. In the course of the
| support norton told me to delete the windows system files smss.exe and
| crss.exe. A later chat with a norton operative informed me that these are
| windows files and need for correct operation. They then told me to contact my
| PC manufacturer and repair the windows installation. I have tried to repair
| it but the setup procedure stalls at the point where Setup asks to press
| ENTER to set up Windows, R to repair or F3 to exit. The screen says up but no
| furtehr action takes place.
|
| Can anyone advise me on a route round this problem.

There are anti virus News Groups specifically for this type of discussion.

microsoft.public.security.virus
alt.comp.virus
alt.comp.anti-virus

Those file names are legitimate. However, there are infectors that use those names. They
just don't execute from the real location of the legitimate files %windir%\system32. So if
they are executed from some other location, it is a sure sign of malware.



For non-viral malware...

Please download, install and update the following software...

* Ad-aware SE v1.06
http://www.lavasoft.de/
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/

* SpyBot Search and Destroy v1.4
http://security.kolla.de/

After the software is updated, I suggest scanning the system in Safe Mode.

I also suggest downloading, installing and updating BHODemon for any Browser Helper Objects
that may be on the PC.

* BHODemon

http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloadget.php?id=3550&file=11&evp=245a87539eea8ed6904332b4b8b8442d

For viral malware...

* Download MULTI_AV.EXE from the URL --
http://www.ik-cs.com/programs/virtools/Multi_AV.exe

To use this utility, perform the following...
Execute; Multi_AV.exe { Note: You must use the default folder C:\AV-CLS }
Choose; Unzip
Choose; Close

Execute; C:\AV-CLS\StartMenu.BAT
{ or Double-click on 'Start Menu' in C:\AV-CLS }

NOTE: You may have to disable your software FireWall or allow WGET.EXE to go through your
FireWall to allow it to download the needed AV vendor related files.

C:\AV-CLS\StartMenu.BAT -- { or Double-click on 'Start Menu' in C:\AV-CLS}
This will bring up the initial menu of choices and should be executed in Normal Mode.
This way all the components can be downloaded from each AV vendor's web site.
The choices are; Sophos, Trend, McAfee, Kaspersky, Exit this menu and Reboot the PC.

You can choose to go to each menu item and just download the needed files or you can
download the files and perform a scan in Normal Mode. Once you have downloaded the files
needed for each scanner you want to use, you should reboot the PC into Safe Mode [F8 key
during boot] and re-run the menu again and choose which scanner you want to run in Safe
Mode. It is suggested to run the scanners in both Safe Mode and Normal Mode.

When the menu is displayed hitting 'H' or 'h' will bring up a more comprehensive PDF help
file. http://www.ik-cs.com/multi-av.htm


* * * Please report back your results * * *