I've heard StopZilla discussed elsewhere, with the same sort of mixed
results. I suspect you'll be able to solve this problem with
Malawarebyte's Anti-Malware, which seems to be the most competent app
out there right now, and has a fully functional free version. Super Anti
Spyware has a good reputation also.
With a computer that badly infected, I'd be tempted to re-format.  It's
not unusual in these cases to find that the AV program did its job, and
the user was indiscriminately clicking and allowing these infections to
occur.

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [PCSOFT] Opinions on STOPzilla?
From: Joyce A <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Mon, October 26, 2009 8:05 am
To: [log in to unmask]

My nephew Raymond's computer is loaded down with viruses, to the point 
where his computer was disabled. He has not kept his Spybot S & D nor 
his Spyware Blaster up-to-date, but did keep his AVG Free 8.5 updated, 
each time he went online. I succeeded in pulling some of the viruses' 
fangs in his registry editor, and was then able to do some research
online.

In doing that research, I ran across something called STOPzilla. I 
downloaded it (took about four hours on his dial-up connection!), 
scanned with it, and it came up with 105 infections. When I asked it to 
clean them out, the software took me back to the STOPzilla Web site, 
where I might have gotten a "lifetime" subscription for $39.95, or a 
year for $9.95. It assured me that my credit card information was 
"safe," and also informed me that, if I were in doubt, I could call a 
1-800 number to get the key.

After that, I took STOPzilla out of his computer, and did a little more 
snooping online; that turned up about 60/40 bad to good. So, opinions 
please? Is STOPzilla worthwhile? Or is there some kind of freeware 
"out there" that will do a better job of taking the rest of those 
infections out? I am due to go back up to my sister's house tomorrow or 
Wednesday.

Raymond's computer is much like my own: eMachines, running XP Pro SP 2, 
with Mozilla Firefox as his (out-of-date) browser (for some reason, two 
tries at downloading updates came up with corrupted files), and Mozilla 
Thunderbird. One of those viruses has hijacked his Contacts and sent me 
two infected messages, which are safely stored in my mailbox at the 
server. TIA for any help!

Joyce in SE Ohio

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