Hacker using p2p on my computer?

Let's see - you're an AOL user - that kinda clues me in that you're pretty new-ish, yes? So we start at the beginning. Everything is suspect. Don't open the email, even with aol's virii scan, unless you know FOR SURE who it's from, and even in those cases suspect it, and scan it yourself too. You can pickup trojans on aol just from clicking links in their chatrooms - that's an uber nono too. don't ever do it, nor links in IM's.

Yes, get the virus scanner, yes get the firewall. Fox is leading you down the right path telling you to repartition/reinstall the os too at this point. Jeez. 867? OUCH.

Luck to you man.

Not really new....I've had AOL for about 6 years...I never open e-mail, if I do not know who sent it (otherwise it gets trashed- never opened)...yeah, I don't ever use chat rooms, I just use message boards/forums, and I always right click once on "links" to identify the properties & web address.....wish I could find the person reasponsible & send them my gift wrapped 867 files:)

yes the spyware and 867 files is bad but i dont think thats what got you in trouble, simply uploading that stuff is enough to tick aol off and terminate your account. when i was stupid and 10 years old, i did a simple port scan and i couldnt log on the next day so i called aol and they said they had terminated my account indefinitely, so i had to make up some excuse for my mom 'n dad as to why we should switch to verizon or some other internet provider. so yeah aol is pretty anal about things you do. p2p works where people only download a segment from you and they get the other parts from other people, but thats when other people have the same file as you, so like 5 or even 10 people could of downloaded a 128k file from ya. but now im just repeatin myself from my first post. get a firewall like all those other smart guys said.

I'm with foxy on the clean install - goodness knows what else you ahve picked up along with the spyware! I once cleaned 189 pieces of spyware of a computer at my old work and getting all of them took me the guts of a day to be sure where gone so would be quicker as well as safer for you to format machine - lol

As for the free firewall am sorry but i wouldn't touch zone-alarm.....I use outpost [Link] have done for quite some time without problems - but I have had problems with Zonealarm and outpost is free as well ;) - but hey we could have a whole thread discussing which is better - heh

What I recommend you do is Format machine...wipe it clean OS everything!
and then before you connect to the internet at all - install Firewall (like outpost - free) install an AntiVirus (like AVG - also free) install Spybot S&D & Adaware and then start adding your programs in once you have them installed do a full scan of system with Adaware/Spybot to check nothing else came free with your progs ;) and your ready to go

If you normally leave machine on I would schedule your AVP to download updates while you sleep and also do a full system scan after just to be sure.

You might wanna get a good system monitor as well and just have it running in the background all the time checking on what programs are trying to install where.

hope that helps

v_Ln

thanks for all the help/links/info & everything :) .....you know, I thought about cleaning out windows & re-installing a while ago cuz this computer has accumulated so much junk- it's amazing. I think I will save that project for the weekend, because it's going to take me a while to save my programs & files onto a few cd's, and I want to make sure I don't forget anything important on my comp...I'll get the firewall & install it onto a disk, that way when I set up my internet again- it will already be there....as far as the aol is concerned, yeah it sucks and I can relate to you "Deftones12" - the AOL account belongs to my parents and brother as well, so I managed to screw them over in this mess. Maybe I can convince AOL to just delete my screen name, and have my parents talk with them & say I will no longer be useing the account- maybe they'll honor it? My friend made a SC name for me to use for free, as long as I want to....so for me, connecting to the internet is no problem, but it just sux that everyone else has to pay the price for it...But hey, someone hacked my brother's screen name 3 times this year- maybe I could just say that we think that's what happened....because I don't know if it was because of something someone downloaded, or if someone used my connection- I'm just gonna have to deny everything, cuz as anal as AOL is being about this, they have their minds made up & I am some copywrite pirate....oh well (btw, sorry about all my long posts, sometimes I don't know when to quit!)
Anyhow, thanks again- everyone- for all the reasponses...even though I haven't solved the "p2p & aol" problem, you guys have been very helpful with everything you have offered & all of your suggestions. Hopefully, by the end of the weekend, my system will be running smooth & free of garbage....
Valhallen- (or anyone that knows) that system monitor you were talking about, that runs in the background...are there free downloads of that anywhere? I have found that numerouse programs over the last few years have "magically" installed themselves on my comp-without my permission, or even any kind of notification...I think I really need something like that.
Thanks All! :)

I use TCmonitor to keep an eye on my registry - it comes free with The Cleaner
there are moe advanced ones which monitor different areas but thats all I have found I have ever needed - plus if something was popping up every 2 mins to tell me this file had been moved or that file had been created i think it would be disbled most of the time and would do me no good anyways ;)

just google for 'the cleaner' its a trojan scanner but comes bundled with TCmonitor

I use it, Outpost, AVG and good computing practice - and when i do weekly scans with Adaware & Spybot the only thing they pick up on is cookies (which i have to have enabled for forums etc) so is doing an alright job ;)

v_Ln

The Advice from Valhallen and foxyloxley is sound and I would make the same recommendations. Especially given the number of files AdAware detected!

867 - man that's quite a few, don't think I've ever seen, heard, or even been told rumours of people with that much crap on their system! lol

It may be wise to setup several accounts on your XP system and only use the admin account when you want to install. Do not, I repeat, do not use an administrator or equivalent account to surf or for general work. Have a look at Pooh sun tzu's tutorial ....
http://www.antionline.com/showthread...hreadid=255353

Other than that, I would recommend the line you are taking, i.e. downloading the Firewall, Anti-Virus, registry monitor, adaware / spyware removers of your choice and their updates and storing them for after a clean install.

Note: It would be wise to install at least the firewall and Anti-Virus right now! Like foxeyloxley, I can not stress this enough. Get protected! This should be your highest priority. Save a clean install for when you have time and don't rush it!

Spend some time reading relevant tutorials on AntiOnline. Here's a couple of links to start you off...

Security Tutorials:
http://www.antionline.com/forumdispl...?s=&forumid=59

Basic Internet Security:
http://www.antionline.com/showthread...hreadid=260373

Hope these help to point you in the right direction. Here's to your weekend activity.

Oh! As for AOL - may be they should be educating their customers with regard to safe computing and good security practices.

Dump them and get a better ISP! I never have and never would recommend them, not even as a last resort! ;o)

This post illustrates the fact that more people need to be intune with computer security. I know a lot of people that don't even know what AV they are using and whether or not it has the current definitions.

Summer-You seem to have a lot of crap on your machine, maybe take some of the advice here and teach the rest of the users that are using the computer. There are a lot of responses about reformatting the HD, might want to talk that over with the rest of the users and make sure that anything they have saved is either burned to a physical medium or they will lose it. I think that reloading the OS is excessive, but that is my opinion. Clean the machine and learn from these experiences. There are certainly enough tools around to clean things up.

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This post illustrates the fact that more people need to be intune with computer security. I know a lot of people that don't even know what AV they are using and whether or not it has the current definitions.

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I couldn't agree more. It would be great if other people, with little security knowledge were made to read this!

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There are a lot of responses about reformatting the HD, might want to talk that over with the rest of the users and make sure that anything they have saved is either burned to a physical medium or they will lose it.

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An excellent observation! I missed that one. Must have been the shock of 867 files found by AdAware! lol

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I think that reloading the OS is excessive, but that is my opinion. Clean the machine and learn from these experiences. There are certainly enough tools around to clean things up.

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I can see your point of view. Yes it is possible to clean it up. A re-install, however, affords the opportunity to configure the security settings and make changes, like a partition for the Operatiing System and a partition for the installation programs, etc.

Certainly, I hope more people than just summerbreeze learn from this.

Yeah, no worries on the computer "Users"...the computer is my own, so right now I can beat it into shape any way I please! I promise to update after the weekend, to let u guys know how it went;)....my comp's less than 2 years old, but it runs so horrible...very slow at times...I have managed to stop some programs at startup to keep it running smoother - but at this point, I really think "re-installing" the OS is a must....ad-aware has found 2 trojans in the last month (in addition to the now famouse "867 spyware files") I also had all my search engines hi-jacked about 2 months ago as well, took me 2 weeks to finally get rid of it....it's just getting really ridiculouse if u ask me.....who knows what other kind of junk is hidden on this computer, and I don't want to take my chances with it....for me, it's worth the trouble to clean this all out, that way *hopefully* I'll never have to deal with this again....thanks again, I'll keep u updated!