window document on my desktop

Since yester day this has happened twice. When I close my IE there is an icon that pops up on my desktop it is white with the Windows logo on it. and an ~ under the icon. when I opened it with notepad it has a list of people in my email address book. I scanned for viruses and nothing. When I checked the properties it says C:\Documents and Settings\registered name\Desktop.

Anyone know what caused this. Thanks.

 

It sounds like you got hit by the SoBig virus. Your antivirus software wouldn't catch it, because the updates to catch this virus weren't released until yesterday afternoon.

Update your antivirus software and scan your system again.

In the meantime, DO NOT open any attachments to e-mails with an extension of ".pif". This virus exploits a security hole in Windows and may use your machine to send spam.

It arrives in e-mail attachments with subject headers, such as: Your details, Thank you!, Re: Thank you!, Re: Details, Re: Re: My details, Re: Approved, Re: Your application, Re: Wicked screensaver or Re: That movie.

The body of the message is short and usually contains either "See the attached file for details" or "Please see the attached file for details."

 

Elnora, do you have Spybot on your computer? I had Spybot for a while and everytime I cleaned out my files I noticed the little file ~ folder appear. Mine was empty however. I just deleted it off desktop and removed spybot because it kept causing problems.

Diane

 

Ok, I checked for an update and it was already updated, because I have it set to update automatically.

I have it set to scan every morning a 5:00. I scanned again and nothing. I haven't received any e-mails with attachments like you described. I do have Mailwasher and any e-mails I receive that are not from someone I know I bounce and delete before they get to my Outlook. So, no virus.

 

No Diane I don't have Spybot. I do have Ad-aware 6.0. Do you know if that is the same type of program?

 

Sounds like the same thing, Elnora. I removed Spybot because it messed up Norton Anti-virus. I got a message it couldn't read my subscription information. Norton told me the anti spyware programs could do that. I removed it and not only did the little file stop appearing, but my Norton was fixed.

Diane

 

I can read my subscription information. There seems to be nothing wrong there. Everything is working properly.

 

I sure wonder if Ad-Ware creates a nightly file when you clean up the files and puts in on your desktop. If everything is working fine.... ??

Diane