Earlier this week when I started my computer Winpooch alerted me of a couple of processes that were trying to run........

C:\ Document and Settings\Karl\lat.exe

and

C:\ WINDOWS \ System 32 \ mssecure.exe

Naturally I rejected the process and set the filters to reject any actions from the above mentioned......

I did a quick scan with Avast and discovered a trojan - "Win32:Sality-W" - on my computer........I quarantined it in the virus chest and removed it from my system.........I then did another scan with ClamWin and also Avast and they both found nothing.....

I then restarted my pc only to find that the same two processes mentioned above were once again trying to run......

I did a google search on mssecure.exe and found that it is associated with Troj/Borobot-B

aka

* Backdoor.Win32.Robobot.w
* DDoS-Boxed
* BKDR_ROBOBOT.GEN

which apparently

"When first run, Troj/Borobot-B copies itself to <Windows>\mssecure.exe and creates a registry entry to run mssecure.exe on startup."

I then followed the intructions provided by Sophos

"At the taskbar, click Start|Run. Type 'Regedit' and press Return. The registry editor opens.

Before you edit the registry, you should make a backup. On the 'Registry' menu, click 'Export Registry File'. In the 'Export range' panel, click 'All', then save your registry as Backup.

Locate the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE entry:

HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
.mssecure
"<Windows>\mssecure.exe"

and delete it if it exists. "

The mssecure.exe. entry wasn't where Sophos said it would be but I found it eventually and deleted it.......

Did another scan with both Clamwin and Avast and both found nothing.....

Things were fine for a couple of days until this morning when I started up and guess who was back?

C:\ Document and Settings\Karl\lat.exe

and

C:\ WINDOWS \ System 32 \ mssecure.exe

I once again set the filters on Winpooch to reject all actions from these two as I had changed the filters back to default........

That seemed to have worked in the sense that they can't run but the biggest problem is that I can't seem to find the registry entries they made........what concerns me even more is that neither Clamwin or Avast have found anything on my C:\ despite repeated scans......

I looked for the mssecure.exe entry in my registry and can't find it.......has it not made the changes to the registry yet?...........I also had a hell of a time finding LAT.EXE as it is not in C:\ Document and Settings\Karl\lat.exe..........In fact the only file that I eventually found that I think could be is in C:\ WINDOWS \ Prefetch

So now my questions are:

1.) Why is neither Clamwin or Avast picking up anything?........is it because I stopped it from running and it is just sitting in the Prefetch folder?......or is there another reason?
2.) How in the hell do I keep on picking up the same bloody trojan - is there some patch that I don't have and its repeatedly exploiting the same vulnerability?

and finally

3.) How do I get rid of it once and for all?

Should I just delete the LAT.EXE file from the prefetch folder?

Any and all help will be greatly appreciated......

Karl

I installed a program from a UK company called PREVX last night and it found what I hope was the last of the malware.........

https://www.prevx.com/

I am a little concerned though that Clamwin and Avast missed some of these programs.......

Any insights into why this may have happened?

Thanks

K

I understand that Previx is one of those behavior blockers that doesn't depend upon a virus database. It sounds like you had a "persistent" virus, and perhaps there was a double payload. Check the databases for ClamWin and Avast to see if those viruses are in their databases. If they aren't, contact them both after a day or so and inform them.

Continue to scan with Avast and ClamWin. I also suggest that you do a free online scan with a couple of other commercial antivirus vendors--say Kaspersky and F-Secure. If nothing shows up, then you've probably gotten rid of it. Also make sure you have all Microsoft "patches" for your operating system.

Clamwin only uses a virus database to check for viruses, but I think that after it's been around in a real-time version for awhile, they will add some other techniques for checking as well.

Regards,