Annette: Your post made me laugh- a lot of those posts sound like Chinese to me, too. That's why I leave computer maintenance issues to my husband. He's really good with this stuff but since it won't connect to the internet it has been tough. Also, he only has so much time to spend on it. My husband probably won't let anyone work on that PC because he has a lot of sensitive stuff on there- not only our own but sometimes that of employees of his company, too. He has at least started to back of some of the information in case he wipes out everything to reinstall the system. That PC is 3 years old so he says the easiest, cheapest, best thing to do might be just to replace the computer. Fran, I did go to the computer help forum. My husband had already tried all of the suggested fixes except one, which didn;t work when he did try it. So we're right back where we were last Thursday when infected. I'm not very good with this laptop,either. I can't even type on this flat keyboard. Karen

it does take a little getting used to and letting the program learn, it will pop up and ask you do you want to let such and such connect to the internet you will likely know what is asking because you are trying to use something that needs access so in those cases say yes, if it is something that needs to access it regularly like your antivirus check mark where it says remember this so it does not ask each time. Do not give server rights some things will ask but it is not necessary once you say no to server rights it will next pop up asking for access, that you can allow. If it is something you do not recognize asking then say no and see if you can determine what it is, if you had some type of malware that is trying to phone home you would not want to allow that access. I prefer mine to pop up and ask each time with some of the rarely used stuff I like to know what is connecting. When getting zonealarm or any other free firewall or any program actually be very alert during the install period and uncheck or do not allow the addition of any toolbars or extras, Zone alarm unfortunately now does try to include a toolbar with the free version, you do not want that toolbar. and if you have problems or questions just ask. When something like generic win 32 something ask for permission say yes or you will not be able to connect to the internet, that is one to check mark always allow. Yes as grandms said with cable you have a direct connection and with no router in between you and the internet that even more dictates the use of a software firewall. The benefit of a router with built in hardware firewall is great but I use both on my windows machines, actually my linux has guarddog firewall built into it so I even have one on linux. The link I had provided the main reason I do refer that link is that there are such good instructions and pictures for someone new to firewalls.

Win32:Refroso, I don't like the looks of this and my abilities end here. It could be a false positive. But with the symptoms you have and some of the information I have found would feel much better if you go to a malware removal forum for more thorough scans and mostly an expert opinion. At this time I am going to supply a link where we send folks for Malware issues. Please follow the instructions at the link provided and post the required logs, it's important you post the logs. You will need to register and create an account there here is link, Please link back to here too so they know I sent you. Let us know what the outcome is.

I do not know if what you are seeing is the real shield or if you have one of the fake AV infections which produces a fake shield it sounds like you do have one of the infections. Run malwarebytes asap and post the scan results here please. Please download Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware to your desktop. * Double-click mbam-setup.exe and follow the prompts to install the program. * At the end, be sure a checkmark is placed next to Update Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware and Launch Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware, then click Finish. * If an update is found, it will download and install the latest version. * Once the program has loaded, select Perform full scan, then click Scan. * When the scan is complete, click OK, then Show Results to view the results. * Be sure that everything is checked, and click Remove Selected. * When completed, a log will open in Notepad. Please save it to a convenient location. The log can also be found here: C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Application Data\Malwarebytes\Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware\Logs\log-date.txt