Oh my God.

This morning, I go on my computer and there's this ANTI-VIRUS warning that tells me it's running a scan and I have 20,000 viruses but until I subscribe to ANTIVIR XP 08, it won't take the spyware and viruses off my computer.

Well....I knew immediately that this was spyware, masking as an anti-virus program.

It would not let me do anything. And if I tried to go to add/remove programs (and sure enough, there it was), when I clicked on REMOVE PROGRAM, it would start to remove it, then the whole pop up thing started and there it was again.

I tried 14 times. I rebooted my computer, I tried x...everything out. I tried to go on the internet. Want to know what happened when I tried to go on the internet?

I got their website and it prompted me to pay either $49.99 or $99.00 and it would erase all spyware.

I called up Verizon Tech Support and because I could not do the sharing/remote thing, they apologized and said "you have to bring your computer in and have them manually remove the Spyware..that this was a MAJOR BAD SPYWARE that controlled everything on my computer.

So I took a walk to the only computer guy in my neighborhood, a Compustar computer store. I told him what happened. He said: "For $59.99 I'll try and get it out, but if I can't I have to erase your whole hard drive, then you will need the Windows Numbers, and you have to give me the disks and I'll re-install everything for you".

First of all, I don't know where the Windows thing is. I panicked big time.

I imagined going home and telling Alan, "we have to buy a new computer".

Well there was Alan, pressing the F10 key, and he put the computer into some kind of Config mode (or something like that).

He got rid of the Spyware. It put our computer like it was the first day we got it. BUT, all of the programs were still there, all the icons were on the desktop, but they looked completely different.

My desktop looked different.

My Outlook express icons were still there. Because I could go on the internet, I called the Verizon Tech guy and this time, he walked me through setting up the 2 Outlook Express Accounts. He re-installed my anti-virus software, and we checked for that horrible Spyware thing. It was gone.

I do not know how Alan did this, nor did I ever think I'd be on this computer at 6 p.m. tonight. Believe me, I dodged a bullet BIG TIME.

Have any of you ever encountered this SPYWARE?

It's a major bad one.

Melody