Thought I got it all but...

I recently ran a Norton Systemworks scan on my system which recognized many adware/spyware applications and files. Most of these deleted with no problem but there were a few I had to go in and manually remove as per Symantec's instructions. The next day I noticed that whenever I opened my IE browser, there were two other browser windows that would quickly open and then disappear. Thinking that I may have missed some adware/spyware, I got a copy of Adaware 6.0 which found more adware and deleted it however, it doesn't seem to have removed whatever is causing the extra browser windows to open and then close. Does anyone know what this would be? Any help would be appreciated!

Check the following:

1. is your start/home page changed?
if you change it back on your, and it goes back on what it was itself, then you still have some hijack spyware.

2. find hijackthis (google) and run a scan. the log you get should be posted here so someone can indentify what should be removed.

Also, you could try search on hijackthis, you might find a lot of logs posted here and solutions what should be removed...

Do you have any form of popup or popunder blockers being used? And in what browser is this happening in?

The quickly opening and then closing of a window sounds to me like a popup opening and being quickly shut down by some sort of blocker. The blockers I use are much quicker,and I never see any popups, but there are some blockers that are slower and you see a new window before the blocker kills it.

Thanks for the reply. I'm using IE 6.0. My ISP (Rogers Yahoo) has a new browser that we can use but I still prefer IE. I'm using Norton Antispam but I have the popup blocker part disabled since it seems to block everything including stuff I actually want and I'm too lazy to go in and configure it for every site that I want to have access too. As I mentioned though, I have Adaware installed but this is more of a adware removal tool that is only run when I need it rather than running all the time in the background I believe.

Please run SpyBot and Adaware .

Download the latest versions here:
* Adaware
* Spybot Make sure they are fully updated by clicking on the globe icons.

If you need help running these tools, here are some helpful tutorials.
Spybot Tutorial
Adaware Tutorial

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Please use one/all of these free online scans. Let them fix everything they find.

* PandaSoft
* TrendMicro
* Symantec

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Open notepad and paste in the following lines:

del c:\ *.tmp
del %temp%\*.tmp /f
del %windir%\prefetch\*.*
del %windir%\temp\*.* /f

Save to desktop as 'clean.bat', file type as ‘all files’

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Boot into SAFE MODE by tapping the f8 key during boot up.

Run Spybot.

Run Adaware with the following settings:

Quote:

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[list][*]Configure Ad-aware[list][*]Click on the Gear-shaped icon at the top to open the Settings window.[*]All of the following settings I mention should be enabled (green checkmark). Some settings cannot be enabled in certain versions of Windows. If a setting I mention is grey and can't be enabled, skip it.[*]General Settings - Automatically save log-file, Automatically quarantine objects prior to removal, and Safe Mode (always request confirmation)[*]Scanning Settings
[list][*]Scan Within Archives[*]Click on 'Click here to select drives + folders' and check next to each hard drive then hit ok.[*]Scan Active Processes[*]Scan Registry[*]Deep Scan Registry[*]Scan my IE favorites for banned URL’s[*]Scan my Hosts file[*]Advanced Settings - Enable all four options under 'Log-file Detail level'[*]Tweak Settings

• Under 'Scanning Engine' - Enable 'Unload recognized processes during scanning', 'Include basic Ad-aware settings in logfile', and 'Include additional Ad-aware settings in logfile'
• Under ‘Cleaning Engine’ - Enable 'Let Windows remove files in use at next reboot'
• Click Proceed
• Click on the 'Start' button in the lower right.
• Select 'Use custom scanning options', enable 'Activate in-depth scanning', and click Next. The scan will take several minutes to complete. When the scan is complete click Next.
• Right click on the list of items and click 'Select all items' then click Next. Press Yes to confirm. The detected items are now quarantined.
• Close Ad-aware and reboot.

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Run the clean.bat file. When prompted, say yes.

See if that helps. :D

you can also install Spywareblaster and Spywareguard which have in-built live-update. and both help you restore any BHO or spyware installed on your system. SpywareGuard also has real time protection. and like groovicus said install Spy-Bot but even Spy-Bot recomends installing SpywareBlaster as it gives you more control over Active-x components.
get
SpywareBlaster at http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html
SpywareGuard at http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareguard.html.