BleepingComputer.com: Spywareguard 2008 IE7 Hijack

The information on this site regarding Spyware Guard 2008 is lacking...

Spywareguard2008, Spyware Guard 2008

This program does much more than is mentioned in the BleepingComputer.com malware removal guide. Most importantly, it either hijacks IE7 or your Default Search Settings; I'm not sure which at this time. The fact is that infected with this malware, I was redirected away from any page regarding Spywareguard2008. Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool was unable to install or run from the Microsoft Website. A Google Search from my infected computer showed pretty much the same results as this uninfected machine, with BleepingComputer.com being the first hit; however, all links in the Google Search redirected to Yahoo Search pages like Yahoo! Answers for no good question, Yahoo! Job Search... And other redirects to unuseful pages. So this should be know.

I was unable to download or install any known legit anti-malware software successfully with Spyware Guard 2008 running.

Also, Windows Defender said it identified the malware three times (with different messages each time) saying that it deleted it... No Such Luck!

Spyware Guard 2008 also hijacks Windows Security Center and Firewall. Any attempt to change settings in Windows Security Center will result in the Spyware Guard 2008 User ID / Password Dialog poping up. So you can't do anything with your Windows Security Center or Firewall. Because of this problem (which is not mentioned in the BleepingComputer.com Description of What this programs does) Windows XP Security Center continually pops up a balloon telling you you're not protected because the Anti-Virus software is not present. This is because, I think, Spyware Guard has hijacked Windows Security Center and changed the settings from, in my case, "I have an Anti-Virus program that I will monitor myself" to Spyware Guard 2008 Unregistered. So it acts exactly as my system did when my McAffe subscription ended... This is an infinite loop which should be addressed here.

The program is spywareguard2008.exe, while this is mentioned in the malware removal guide, a search of BleepingComputer.com forums turns up no results for "spywareguard" (without quotes). The BC search engine should be updated to reflect this fact.

The below link deals with Spywareguard and explains how to deal with it, provides ways around not being able to run programs and cleans this user's PC.

I searched for spywareguard2008

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/ind...pywareguard2008