don't click it, could be a virus

I had a shield come up, saying I had serious pc problems. Yep, when I clicked it I DID have serious problems. A BIG BAD VIRUS and cost me bucks to get rid of it.

It still pops up from time to time, but I ignored it now.

Browser Defender is a legitimate program. It checks websites as you visit them. More info needed...What OS and browser are you using. What exactly is the message you're getting? What is happening? What can't you do?

Mine was a VIRUS

Browser Defender may be a legit program...but what you have is probably a Virus. Check this link. I got a virus and it looked like a legit program. It turned out to be a big PITA. I was fixing to haul my computer in, but downloaded and ran this program (it's free) and that took care of it!

http://www.superantispyware.com/?tag=GOOGLE-SUPERANTISPYWARE

Here is a link that might be useful: Browser Defender VIRUS!

The one thing I loved about WEBTV was that it did not have a hard drive and everything was serverside. Nothing could be downloaded so no chance of a virus. When I got my first computer I fell for one of those "warning" scams and the warning actually gave a virus.

The biggest clue in those warnings is that if you don't have the program already installed on your computer there is no way it could be detecting and defending your computer. If you don't recognize the name of the defender don't click it. oooNorton = Yes. oMcAffie = Yes. o Bob'sDefender = No.

Browser Defender is a legitimate program. It is telling you you have an error.

Check out the site in the link.

Do you have any programs on your computer such as Malwarebytes, Super Antispyware, etc. If not, you should.

Try Bumps link.

There are several FREE security programs available, and we all should have them on our computers.

Good luck.

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: Check here

I suggested Malwarebytes in the other thread. It works.

Here is a link that might be useful: malwarebytes

Another software you might think about is Spyware Blaster. It works like an anti virus and keeps spyware off your PC. It does not scan. It is recommended the PC help forum.

Here is a link that might be useful: Spyware blaster

"Browser Defender" is a legitimate program, but that DOES NOT mean that the "alert" is legitimate! This shows why these things work for the ones trying to cause trouble. They often attach a legitimate name or a similar sounding name and people go oh, that's safe and BAM, your suckered. Keep alert folks, there's more to it than meets the eye.

When you have stuff like this popping up, it's time to double check your defenses. When you say you can't do anything on your computer, is that because you're infected? If so, you may well be infecting your husband's system too. Let's face it, IF your system is infected and that's causing the trouble, then it's likely that your husband's machine is no better secured than yours, and your surfing habits allow stuff in. If that's the case, it's only a matter of time before his machine is paralyzed too, again, assuming that your machine is infected. You need to take action now.

You need a good antivirus program and there's a lot of good free ones out there too so there's no excuse for not having one. AVG, Avira, Avast are a few good free ones, but you need to understand that many malware issues are not viruses so an antivirus is only one tool you need in your defense arsenal. Don't think that just because you have an antivirus, you have everything you need. You may have a stove in your house but you probably need a refrigerator too. And a toilet. And a sink. Don't get fooled into thinking one appliance will do everything for you.

Your most important and first line of defense is a firewall. Windows built in firewall is feeble at best but better than nothing until you can immediately get something better. I like Comodo the best of all I've used.

Spybot, SuperAntiSpyware, A-squared, Malwarebytes and more are good anti-malware programs and supplement your antivirus. They do different jobs.

Spywareblaster is an excellent program, especially if you insist on using Internet Explorer. IE is the swiss cheese of browsers, security-wise. You're inviting trouble by using it. Opera, Safari, Firefox, K-meleon, Mozilla, Chrome, there's lots of excellent browsers out there far more secure. Advanced SystemCare is a fantastic multi-function program to keep in the arsenal.

Watch your email. Don't just open it because it tells you to! Although infections through email are far less common these days there's still enough of them to warrant concern.

Most malware these days come from "drive by" infections. You go to a site and it installs it on your system and you won't even know about it when you don't use a firewall, real-time antivirus and check for malware regularly.

But the most important thing to staying safe is yourself. Educate yourself on safe surfing. Don't be afraid to use your computer, but use it safely. I haven't had a virus on my system in over 10 years and caught all of them that got on there. (They were email attachments from foolish people who forward every "cute" thing to everyone in their address book.) I credit this to several things:
1) Using Opera as my primary browser. It's the most secure browser out there.
2) Having Spywareblaster on my machines. I was laughed at by many of the people in the Comphelp forum when I suggested Spywareblaster (at the time - *most* of those people are now gone) but it showed promise to me and has long since proven itself.
3) I regularly update Windows, browsers, antivirus, malware detectors, etc.
4) The firewall is the first thing installed on a system and it's turned on BEFORE connecting to the internet. Occasionally I get a caution that something is wrong and I can look at it and see that it should not be installing something like that.
5) I replace all feeble programs with better ones. IE and Windows Firewall as examples. For that matter I even replace the calculator, media player, even the clock and Notepad programs with better stuff. Makes "computing" more productive and enjoyable.
6) I don't click on popups! I close them. And by using Opera I get very few unwanted popups anyway.
7) If I am suspicious that something might have gotten past my multi-layered defenses, I'll use an online scanner like TrendMicro or Bitdefender to do an online scan of my system (or the system in question).
and the last thing I can think of offhand, though there probably will be more I think of later:
8) I try to educate myself on cons.

One of my biggest frustrations is when I see someone jump on the internet shouting "LOOK EVERYONE, I'M USING MY NEW COMPUTER!!! JUST GOT IT TODAY!!!!!! I know that's a service call waiting to happen. And then they blame the computer. (sigh)

Happy and safe computing to all and to all a good afternoon.

Cynic - can you give me a link to Opera? Is it free or something I have to pay for?

"The biggest clue in those warnings is that if you don't have the program already installed on your computer there is no way it could be detecting and defending your computer. If you don't recognize the name of the defender don't click it. Norton = Yes. McAffie = Yes. Bob'sDefender = No."

I think what Dilly Dally meant to say was "McAfee = Yes."

If you see something named McAffie purporting to be computer/internet security, you shouldn't trust it.

thank you so much, i learned a lot...

Because of this thread I just downloaded Spywareblaster and set it up. Perhaps this is a dumb question, but do I have to do anything now so that it removes all the junk? Like click on "Go" or something (I didn't see anything indicating I should click for an action)? Or will it do it the next time I boot my machine?

You brought up an excellent point Lindsay. Although that was a typo on my part it brings up an example of one of the ways people are tricked into clicking on malware and viruses. The bad guys will creat a website or popup to mimic real programs out there that are well known. This trick is rampant in mass emailing and on discussion board postings. Something as simple as the difference between K-Mart.com and KMart.com could send the user to a site that will wreck havoc on their computer. This trick is common with phishing schemes. Did you just make a credit card reservation at Raddisson Hotel instead of Radisson Hotel? Also be aware of a well known site that appears as a .net or .org if you know it to commonly be a .com (or vice versa). Lots of people don't notice this and click the link.

One of the things I try to do is show the text of any link I put into quick link on a discussion board. This way a person can run the link through Norton search or Google to make sure it is a valid link if they wish. I've gotten horrible things that locked up my computer from discussion boards and no longer click quick links that people post.

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Scissors, Opera is now free and has been for a long time. I highly recommend it. Click the link below to see what their browser offers.

http://www.opera.com

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Cynic, thank you for the goldmine of information. You are always so helpful and explain everything in an easy to understand format.

One question I have.........some of those pop-ups are designed to be activated by clicking they red 'X' because they know that 99.9% of people will try to close it. What can be done? Sometimes a bad website won't let one close out the tab. Is there something that a compurter illiterate person such as myself can do or does one have to reformat their whole hard drive?

Here is a link that might be useful: Opera

Scissors, all of the programs I mentioned are either free or have free versions available. Hope you enjoy Opera. I've used Opera for I suppose over 10 years now. In case you didn't know, it also has an email client in it. I've never used it since I mostly use webmail these days but I know a few people who really like it. Take some time and get used to the program. You can "block content", aka ads (and it does it smoothly!), it has a great spell check and probably the best popup blocker around.

Dilly_dally, thank you! I always enjoy our conversations whether we agree or disagree. You're a perfect example of someone who can have a lively discussion without going crazy! LOL As for the popup, you mentioned a good point. You have to be careful to choose the correct one ("X") to close. However, an easy alternative is to use Ctrl + W and that will close the open window in virtually all browsers. Ctrl + Tab will switch you back and forth so you can be sure you have the one you want to close highlighted, then Ctrl + W will close it. Let me know if there's any other questions. I'll be glad to try to help if I can.

Suzieque, once set up there's not much to do. Remember, Spywareblaster is not a running program so it doesn't use any resources on your computer. It puts "killbits" in the system that prevent the garbage from being placed. It's really an ingenious method and very effective. You *do* however need to update it occasionally. Check every month or two - it's simple. Open the program, click "Updates" on the left side, then click the check for updates button in the middle of the screen. If there's any updates, it'll automatically install them. You have to do one more thing though if it does update. It'll say however many items are unprotected. Simply click the "Enable all protection" (or wording to that effect) and it'll activate everything. When you're done, click the red "X" in the upper corner and you're done for a while. You do have other options with it though. You can set up a custom blocking list (various ones are available on the internet) in addition to the one in there where you can add sites to it that you want to block or remove them if you want to view the site. If you're not comfortable working with it, just go with the standard stuff. There's different tools in there for other purposes too. Look them over and if you want to do something with it, great, but just the basic stuff will give you unbelievable protection without costing you any performance on your machine.

Enjoy your computers all.

Here is a link that might be useful:

Thanks for the info, folks - especially cynic.

I sometimes get some stuff in my system that causes trouble.

I remember you speaking well of Opera earlier, cynic ... and son has used Firefox and likes it.

Happy computing ... and browsing, everyone.

ole joyful