129 Items On AVG Scan - Is My Computer Infected?

[Whitespirit66]

I carried out a full scan on my Ad-Aware (Lavasoft) computer security, and it came up with 129 items detected/privacy objects. They were tracking cookies with a TAI (whatever that is of 3, and MRU objects with TAI of 0.

I know very little about computers. I have now removed these items. Do these results mean that my computer is/was infected? If it is, how did it get through the Ad-Aware and AVG security that I have? Is there anything else I should be doing? How can I stop this happening in future? hould I be worried?

 

[kjacko]

your software did its job and has protected your pc. However it may have been reporting some false positives.
It would be best, for your peace of mind to install another AV or AS programme to make sure.
Try:
Avira
Super Antispyware
Malwarebytes

they are all free and can be googled.

 

[dave.m]

WS66,
Tracking cookies are not really a problem.
They are small text files that are placed on your computer by every site that you visit on the web.
The TAI cookies are third party cookies used mainly for advertising and the MRU are the Most Recently Used ones.

As Adaware found them, this post from an Adaware Forum may explain them:
http://www.lavasoftsupport.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=18691&view=findpost&p=78477

You can set your browsewr to remove all cookies everytime you close it but then you would have to log on to every site that needs a login everytime that you visit. Like this site, you would need your username and password every visit.

They are not an infection or virus so don't worry. Without cookies, using the internet would be unbearably long winded.
dave

 

[kjacko]

You can set your browsewr to remove all cookies everytime you close it but then you would have to log on to every site that needs a login everytime that you visit. Like this site, you would need your username and password every visit.

They are not an infection or virus so don't worry. Without cookies, using the internet would be unbearably long winded.
dave

QTF!!!
This is what the eejits on broadband tech support tell you to do each time you have issues and its soooooo annoying! Especially when you work in IT yourself and the people you have to support have more intelligence than the tech support you've just rung!

Anyway....i digress!

 

[dave.m]

It would be best, for your peace of mind to install another AV or AS programme to make sure.
Try:
Avira
Super Antispyware
Malwarebytes

they are all free and can be googled.

kjacko,
Don't you think it would have been wise to tell Whitespirit to disable or remove his AVG before trying another AntiVirus Program?

Also, as he said:

I know very little about computers.

just telling him to try SAS and MBAM without giving some instructions and also pointing out that they are NOT real-time protection programs, could have left him in lumber.

QTF!!!
This is what the eejits on broadband tech support tell you to do each time you have issues and its soooooo annoying! Especially when you work in IT yourself and the people you have to support have more intelligence than the tech support you've just rung!

I have no ideas what your reply means, but someone may come along and explain it to me.

 

[TonyWarrington]

I know very little about computers. I have now removed these items. Do these results mean that my computer is/was infected?

All you got from Adaware was a summary of tracking cookies it does not mean that your computer is/was infected as such but all the same you did right imo to get rid of them.
Quote from Lavasoft:
As third-party cookies may be a intrusion of user privacy Ad-Aware is detecting them and listing those under the Privacy objects tab ie. not under the Critical objects tab. We are doing this as a service to our users in order to protect their privacy.

TAI categories information Here
MRU = "most recently used"

Malwarebytes and Superantispyware are both very good and can be added to your arsenal of programs to fight the baddies
http://www.superantispyware.com/
http://www.malwarebytes.org/

Have no experience of Avira but if you are going to try it you must first disable or remove AVG (as Dave stated) before installing - similarly you should only allow 1 antispyware to run at one time

 

[empip]

If using Avira freeby, the following may be of interest..
http://www.tipsfor.us/2007/08/15/make-avira-antivir-free-edition-more-usable/

-0-

 

[kjacko]

Dave,
QTF means, Quoted For Truth. I was agreeing with you.

 

[Igorian]

Dave,
QTF means, Quoted For Truth. I was agreeing with you.

Unless he was reading the Urban dictionary

 

[kjacko]

Dave,
QTF means, Quoted For Truth. I was agreeing with you.

Unless he was reading the Urban dictionary

I never knew that existed, lol, and its not what i meant. Blimey no wonder Dave retorted the way he did.
Sorry dude, i was genuinely agreeing with what you said earlier

I do work in I.T. and the methods i use work for me and the company i work for. However it does seem that your knowledge of AV definitions etc is better than mine and you do explain yourself in a more user firendly way than i do.
So, in future, in threads like these, i'll await for your input before i chime in and confuse anybody!

In the meantime, i hope the op has got his issues sorted (no thanks to me eh?)

 

[dave.m]

KJack,

I wish you had typed it the other way round ;

Q F T Quoted For Truth

I still wouldn't have known what it meant but a Google would have produced this:
http://tinyurl.com/bt66ua
which would have left me just as confused before I started but not as angry as when I found the same link that Igorian found.

Sorry for any misunderstanding.

Shake on it.

dave

 

[kjacko]

Lol, christ you can take your pick from that list of results

Either way, you now know i meant no offence, so all is good with the world.