How to Remove "AntiVirus 2009"

There is an infectious agent — known as AntiVirus 2009 (and variants of that name) — that is taking over computers around the world. It constantly displays warnings about infections on the computer — and offers the opportunity for you to save your computer. All you have to do is to give a criminal your credit card number and and authorization to steal money using it.

The only thing that is really wrong on your computer is that "... AntiVirus 2009..." is nagging you. If you allow the criminal to rip you off, he will stop the nagging.

The are several variants of the name of this malware. It calls itself

• XP Antivirus
• Antivirus 2009
• Antivirus 2010
• Internet Antivirus Pro

and probably a few other names.

For a while, we computer pros knew only one way to fix the problem: reformat the computer's hard drive and re-install Windows. While it might be possible to save the data on the hard drive, the process is expensive and annoying.

However, the fine folks at BleepingComputer.com have developed a tool that does most of the work involved in cleaning up the computer. They also provide excellent instructions.

I have used the tool from BleepingComputer and it works well. The downside is that I can't charge as much to repair the damage. Duh-oh!

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/malware-removal/uninstall-antivirus-2009

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic154529.html (earlier versions)