How to Get Rid of a Trojan Virus on Windows Vista

A Trojan virus is a virus that is designed to hide inside another program, much like the legendary Trojan Horse. It activates when you run what appears to be the legitimate program. Before it activates, it is unlikely that you will know the virus even exists. But once the virus activates, it will act and behave like any other virus, attempting to destroy your programs, memory, or computer in whatever manner it was programmed. If you ever think you have a Trojan virus, follow these steps to get rid of it.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Internet connection

1. Download and install AVG anti-virus software for Windows Vista (See Resources for the website address).

2. Allow AVG to complete its scan. When you complete and installation of AVG it will automatically scan your computer for viruses. Keep in mind that this process may take a long time, especially if you have a large disk or a slow computer. Do not interrupt the scan. Let AVG search everything on your computer the first time. During this time, AVG will search for Trojan viruses for you as well as any other types of viruses your computer might contain.

3. Watch the screen when the scan has completed and see if the Trojan was found. If you had a Trojan virus, the AVG scanner will report the number of infections found and the number removed and healed. Click on "Infections" to see the files that were found and reported infected.

4. Click on the "Remove All Unhealed Infections" button. When the AVG software attempts to remove a virus, it will try and fix the file that was affected by the virus. However, in some cases, the files cannot repaired and the virus cannot be removed. In those cases, AVG will completed delete the file. If AVG can repair the file and remove the virus, it will call those viruses healed.

5. Ensure that you run this file scanning process on a regular basis to reduce the possibility of getting infected with more viruses in the future.

Tips & Warnings

• This free version is only available for non-commercial use. If you are a company, do not use this version. If you know the file that contains the Trojan virus, you can just delete that file.

Resources

• AVG website