Thinkpoint Virus

Sunday I (or rather, my computer) contracted a virus.  The infamous Thinkpoint Virus.  It doesn't do any damage - at least that I have found - but it is quite annoying.  From my research (a.k.a. Googling) I have learned that it affects Windows 9x, 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7.  (I've never even heard of 9x!).  When I purchased this computer four months ago, I installed the "best" (according to current ratings) antivirus software that I could find; so I've felt pretty safe.  Daily, I get messages that it is tracking and deleting cookies, stopping threats and, basically, holding down the fort. 

Well, Sunday it failed.  The walls were breached. 

Here's how it went down:  I had some down time so I was engrossed in an online article detailing past celebritie's Halloween costumes.  Did you know that Pink went as clown in 2008?  You didn't?  Well, now ya do - happy to enlighten you!  Anyway, I was deeply entrenched in my article when all of the sudden my browser closed!  What the heck?!  How dare it?!  I was only on number 7 of 50 - I hadn't even gotten to Kim Kardashian yet!

Before I could call my husband to complain, my antivirus software (or what I THOUGHT was my antivirus software) popped up and told me I was being attacked by a Trojan Horse and to click NEXT for it to proceed in burning the horse and all those pesky Greeks hiding inside it.  So I did; my software hadn't failed me yet - I trusted it!  Well, dang-it, the Greeks won and Troy was breached (but not destroyed! HA!).  (Homer was a great story teller, wasn't he?!) Well, the thing about a Trojan Horse is... IT'S A TROJAN HORSE.  DUH!!

Two seconds after I clicked NEXT I had doubts, but I still believed in my antivirus software; so I pushed those doubts to the side.  "It'll protect me if I'm doing something wrong," I thought.  Well, I thought wrong; to say the least.  The next thing I knew a window popped up saying "Windows Thinkpoint Is Not Functioning, Click To Learn More."  Yeah Right!  Fool Me Once and all that jazz...

At that point I realized that it was not my antivirus software that had popped up to warn me of an attack, but instead it was the virus itself saying "Hello Everybody."  I had gone ahead and downloaded the virus.  (Thinkpoint disguises itself as your antivirus software). 

Come right in, Mr. Serial Killer - would you like some milk and cookies before you chop my head off? 

AGHHH!  I WAS SO ANNOYED WITH MYSELF.  You have NO idea.  My dad has an obsession with computers.  I was setting at his desk learning how to double-click a mouse when other kids were learning to spell their names with crayons.  I KNOW what to look for!!

So, realizing my stupidity; I stopped everything and began closing out of my Point of Sale program (normally I would just force shutdown, but I run my business from this computer and had credit card sales to batch out.)  PROBLEM:  This virus plops a big blue box smack-dab in the middle of your screen so you can only see about two inches around it.  So it took some minimizing and maneuvering, but I was finally able to close my Point of Sale, batch-out my sales and shut down.  (Upon further googling, I learned that Thinkpoint is known for "prohibiting restarting or turning off your computer."  Lucky for me, I was able to shut down without any problems).

My next step was to call Geek Squad (they are expensive and the only reason I called them is because I have my computer under warranty with Best Buy - so they are the ones I have paid in advance to fix any problems).  Well, come to find out - my warranty only covers hardware and NOT VIRUSES!  And to top it all off - it's going to cost me $300.00 to fix!  This is totally not my day - but the kicker is... It totally WAS my day, I was kicking butt in sales.  And then this happened.

So, as you can imagine, (and not blame me for - right, honey?!) I am in extreme freak-out mode by this point and have begun pulling out my hair.  You can ask my husband how bad it was - he had on full riot-gear in self-defense.  Sorry, babe :(

After he calmed me down - not an easy task - he told me he had been Googling on his iPhone and there were tons of blogs and websites talking about this virus and they are all giving the same explanations and directions of how to remove this virus. 

Side note: In the past, he has not been the most computer savvy person - he successfully deleted Windows from his family's home computer in High School.  I don't even remember what he was trying to do, but it defiantly wasn't that! 

Side note #2:  I wrote the above side note really small on purpose, so that maybe he won't see it and get mad at me for revealing an embarising family secret!

So, to say the least, I was wary.  But, "What the heck,"  I thought.  "My computer is already shot and I had an appointment scheduled with Geek Squad for early Monday morning.  If he completely wipes out my hard drive, my scheduled Geek will fix it."

Well, the kid has learned something.  After about an hour he successfully removed Thinkpoint and my computer is non the worse for wear!  So I stood-up my Geek-date (not really, I had to give a 24 hr cancel notice) and got to keep my $300.00!  Woo Hoo!!

There were many websites and blogs that we read, but here are two that we kept coming back to: www.precisesecurity.com/rogue/think-point/
and
www.forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=65312.0

Disclaimer:  I am not guaranteeing this will work for you, but it did for me.  Read everything VERY carefully!

So... The moral of this story is think before you click.  So, that being said...  Happy Clicking!!