COM Surrogate crashing when accessing file/folder "security" tab in "Properties"

I suspect a COM Surrogate Virus/Malware problem.  Here are the symptoms:

 

1. Once logged in (yes, to an administrator account - "mandor" - as you'll see from the FRST log), launching ANY program other than File Explorer (from either the start menu, quick launch bar, etc.) I get the spinning blue circle but nothing appears on the screen.  If I launch any program by right clicking and selecting "Run as Administrator", programs do launch.

 

What I have tried to remedy this:

- Added a new administrator account ('Sonic' as you'll see from the FRST log), and logged into that - result: same behavior

- Checking file permissions (see point number 2 below) for c:\Users\<username> folder.  In File Explorer, right click the folder, and select "Properties".  This comes up fine, but when I select the security tab, I get the infamous "COM Surrogate has stopped working"

- Ran "sfc /scannow" - problem was originally detected, so I ran DISM to try and fix things.  This did not work so I did the following...

- Did an upgrade in place of Windows 10 based on a mounted ISO of Windows downloaded via the Media Creation Tool.  This upgraded me from the "Anniversary Edition" to the newly released "Creators Update", but the behavior mentioned above still persists

- After the update, an "sfc /scannow" comes back clean (i.e. - no problems)

- Ran scans in both Avast and Malwarebytes.  Avast found nothing, Malwarebytes found 8 items which I quarantined and then rebooted.  Problem still exists

 

2. When attempting to view Properties (right clicking on a file or folder) and then the "Security Tab", I get the COM Surrogate has crashed error.

 

3. (and this part is what prompted me to post here) Several websites are launching extra tabs in Chrome when I look hit play on videos (i.e. - YouTube) which lead to suspicious sites.  I can kill the newly created tabs, but Chrome never works correctly (i.e. - hitting play on the videos doesn't do anything) until I kill Chrome entirely and restart.

 

OK.  Happy to provide more information is you need it.

 

NOTE:  Rather than pasting my FRST.txt here in the post, I'm attaching it (it's 7K lines long - most likely due to the fact that I upgraded to the Anniversary Edition within the last 30 days - most of the "One Month Created Files and Folders" section are files that were added on 3/18/17 - the day I successfully upgraded to the Anniversary edition).  I'll attaching both the "FRST.txt" and the "Addition.txt")

 

 Addition.txt   71KB   2 downloads

 FRST.txt   832.37KB   2 downloads

 

Thanks!

 

 

 

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