Last week my computer suddenly got one of those bogus antivirus "virus" programs...it changed my desktop to some blue screen, kept popping up that my computer was infected, etc... you know the drill
it was called, "system tool" or something like that...

i did the usual and ran malwarebytes in safe mode and it got rid of it.

however, now when i go to google/yahoo and search, nothing weird happens.
but when i click on the search result, it takes me to some bogus website like shopcompareus, or dingmanfuneralhome, or some random weird sites...

if i right-click and open in a new tab, it works fine... but rightclicking everytime is a pain in the butt and i shouldn't have to do it
i also can not go to http://www.amazon.com

every website is working correctly except when i google or yahoo or try amazon.com

i did a google search and it seems that i have a "root kit" installed.. i downloaded and ran a bunch of rootkit removal tools, including kaspersky, but they do not find anything. every program i run does not find anything..
any suggestions?

11/8/2010 8:28:27 PM

Backup/save any documents/music/pictures you want to keep ... and reinstall Windows on your computer ... or actually, install Windows 7 and Microsoft Security Essentials on your computer.

Viruses and rootkits are too complicated/embedded these days to be effectively removed in a timely manner.

Good luck.

11/8/2010 8:39:26 PM

This^
It sucks, but right now, it does seem like the best option.

11/8/2010 8:59:29 PM

Before you flatten and re-install, try using this: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/combofix/how-to-use-combofix

It got me out of a similar jam last March

11/8/2010 10:10:10 PM

I had the exact same issue except the kaspersky program you mention found a rootkit and removed it. There's one specific kaspersky rootkit finder that I had to download and the only way I knew about it was some obscure link in the google chrome forums. There were several other kaspersky virus removers listed that found nothing until I found that one link.

^I've heard that is equally effective but if you aren't careful you can remove critical OS files by accident.

[Edited on November 8, 2010 at 10:40 PM. Reason : .]

11/8/2010 10:39:21 PM

You can also try Sophos Anti-Rootkit; it is free: http://www.sophos.com/products/free-tools/sophos-anti-rootkit.html

11/8/2010 10:43:12 PM

http://www.surfright.nl/en/downloads

I ended up using hitman pro to get rid of it on a computer at work. Malwarebytes nor symantec could do anything with it.

11/9/2010 8:09:41 AM

I used this place when I had the redirect problem, it got my computer back to normal.

http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/topic/267407-how-to-fix-google-redirects/

11/9/2010 9:10:09 AM

better yet..

http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/

11/9/2010 2:59:18 PM

this thing was a real bitch to get rid of a couple of months ago

such a bitch, in fact, that i simply reformatted...i was about due to do it, anyway, and it was less annoying

11/9/2010 5:16:17 PM

When I had this a while back I just posted in the bleeping computer forums and had one of their support people walk me through the removal step by step.

11/9/2010 5:41:46 PM

hitman pro got rid of it! Thanks!

everything works great, knock on wood.

11/9/2010 8:20:21 PM