Removing Winfixer Popups

There are least three posts here by people who, having successfully fixed their WinFixer problem by running VirtumundoBeGone, have expressed their desire to send a donation to "TechGuy". If you read things carefully, the "Tech Support Guy" forum is just one of many forums (along with the DELL forum, and "Bleeping Computer" forum) that have recommended the use of VirtumundoBeGone. However, the author/developer of that program is NOT "TechGuy", but rather "secured2k". So if people are making donations, I feel it important that the record be set straight here.
P.S. I am NOT secured2k.

I think the problem is that Winfixer has several variants. The VirtumundoBeGone and the Vundo removal tools I've found do NOT work for my variant.

What I can't believe is that the pay for tools/utilities don't seem to work either. I just can't believe that something that has been around for several weeks still gets past their detections. First couple of days, I'd understand, but this is absurd. I guess SpySweeper is where I'll go next.

Hi, In response to the earlier gentleman who wrote about the Antivirus companies placing some of these on the net. I think he is absolutely correct. The Winfixer virus contantly urges me to buy new antivirus software from Winsoft telling me there is something wrong with my computer.

I have written to them and Urge everyone to write to their local states attorney General's office seeking they take action. While there may be no specific law against them putting a virus on the net per sae , The vast majority of States regard the crime of Fraud as "Theft by deception". Convincing you something is wrong with your computer (when they created the problem) so you will buy their product is fraud!
The States Atty General has the power to act on behalf of the thousands of us affected and sue these clowns into poverty.
Please do like I have done and send out an e mail complaint today! WHen they hear enough, they'll act!

With some detective work (whois lookups and United Kingdom Companies House searches) I was able to work out that Winsoftware Ltd (who apparently created WinFixer) were a company based in Croydon in the UK. This company is now defunct and the winfixer domains are now registered to a post office box in the Ukraine. Maybe WinFixer was originally legitimate software (who knows), but what is clear is that this is now quite a large and organised scam. I wouldn't be surprised if it was being operated by the Russian Mafia.

Many of these scams are put in place so that individuals can make money off of your misery. In lots of cases they make money on a per seat basis by infecting your machine with their malware.

See the site http://www.vitalsecurity.org/ to hear about who are gehind these scams (nothing more than organized crime in the former Soviet Bloc in many cases) paper and money trails and more. There are groups attempting to stop this but it is hard to do when the laws don't reach to certain countries.

http://secured2k.home.comcast.net/tools/VirtumundoBeGone. This worked!!! I had tried everything including tech assistance from Microsoft and nothing including SpySweeper worked. Thanks to all who recommended VirumundoBeGone. Thank God ... Free at last...Free at last!!! I have my computer back!!! I hope they track down the WinFixer scumbags and send a loaded drone their way.

Have had the winfixer problem for weeks. Infuriating!! Even worse are their very explicit pop up ads trying to make me believe that I need to download winfixer to stop them. I have three children and I have to worry now about some sex ad jumping up in front of them. Makes me want to hunt these scumbags down and deal with them personally. I already have Norton antivirus & internet security (now at the highest setting), AND spysweeper. Neither could fix the problem. So I forked out the 39.95 for Xoftspy believing it would save me. I did.... for about 2 hours. Now it does nothing, and their help is no help. Don't waste your money. I wish I had found this site before I wasted mine.

Wow, thank you so much. I had the Winfixer adware thing on my computer for about a month and had looked around for solutions before finally giving up. My popup blocker did nothing, it couldn't be detected as a virus. I didn't know what to do other than get used to it. Then a couple of days ago, I decided to look around again for an inexpensive, simple solution to my problem. Then I came across askbobrankin.com. I read the posts and saw the different strategies other people had used to get rid of the same problem I had. I finally decided to go ahead and trust the second link from the Nov. 20 post because it seemed to me like my last resort. I used the program, which caused my computer to shut down irregularly. But when I started it back up no more Winfixer! It has been four days and my computer is running just as well as it did before i encountered that nasty piece of adware. I am so thankful. It worked for me and I hope it also helps others. Darn Winfixer buggers!

On January 4, 2006, I reported that I used Rob's November 20,2005 solution and it worked. Unfortunately, I became reinfected last week and the previous solution failed to work this time. Perhaps the WinFixer miscreants tweaked their program to bypass that fix. However, I ran across a new fix that worked, and here it is:

Download and run VundoFix: http://www.atribune.org/ccount/click.php?id=4

Double-click VundoFix.exe to run it. Put a check next to Run VundoFix as a task. You will receive a message saying vundofix will close and re-open in a minute or less. Click OK. When VundoFix re-opens, click the Scan for Vundo button. Once it's done scanning, click the Remove Vundo button. You will receive a prompt asking if you want to remove the files, click YES. Once you click yes, your desktop will go blank as it starts removing Vundo. When completed, it will prompt that it will shutdown your computer, click OK. Turn your computer back on.

Try VundoFix at href="http://www.atribune.org/ccount/click.php?id=4

That works! And if it doesn't work today, download it again tomorrow & try it again. They keep updating their removal tool when those jerks change their nastyware to get around it. To prevent reinfection: Update your java!

http://www.java.com/en/download/index.jsp

That was how it got onto your machine....by exploiting a hole in older java versions. You should check in add/remove programs after installing the newer java and make sure you have only 1 version installed. If you see 2 there, uninstall the older version. Otherwise you will still be vulnerable to this pest as it will exploit the older version still on your machine.

VundoFix.exe did it for me after months of torture. Thanks for the help!

Winfixer has turned me grey. Computing is no fun anymore. Spent a small fortune on Anti Virus . Going to try Bobs solution next and if that does,nt work i,m cutting off the plug!

If Winfixer actually is created in the uk, and the company has got a shopper account (paypal etc) why doesn't the government shut down the paypal, and atempt to find who is making this crap, fraud, computer misuse act, theft etc etc.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Winfixer is "free" software, so the victims don't need to pay with Paypal, or a credit card.

i'm facing lots of issues with winfixer virus. i have symantec antivirus corporate edition in my system but it only detects it but can't clean it. symantec website has some steps to remove it. these steps tells to remove a lot of registry entries. but suprisingly none of those entries are present in my registry. i don't know what to do. i don't wanna pay to get it fixed. Please help.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Did you try the Vundofix mentioned earlier in the comments?

i had problem with winfixer ,just like everyone else, i found a forumn site that a guy said to go to your start button then click run and type in regedit , a window will pop up saying regeristry editor.

then u will see a bunch of yellow envelopes and it u keep opening them up ,you will eventually see the winfixer envelope saying winfixer,and just delete it, dont get disapointed because u may open a many as a hundred or so yellow envelopes ,about the time u really get fed up hunting it , you will eventually see it ,and it is as simple as that.just delete it .. i found it and it really worked and u dont have to buy anything.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Random hacking in the registry is not encouraged. There are better ways, see the article and subsequent comments.

I think I downloaded Winfixer several months ago and tried a couple of simple things to remove it..maybe tried restore, not sure. How do I know if I it is still on my computer.

A good anti-virus and anti-spyware combo would detect it. See http://www.askbobrankin.com/antivirus_antispyware.html

I am so happy! i managed to get rid of winfixer, errorsafe and all of the other vmundo crap on my PC using the VundoFix program. Make sure you get the 6.3.0.20 version. I downloaded the 6.3.0.19 version first, but the infection returned. The newer one seems to get rid of it completely, apparently the virus seems to use a 'root kit' or something to hide and then older one doesnt delete it. The new one does gets rid of it tho. get it here: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic18610.html

I had a winfixer infection a while back. I use SpySweeper, which would find it and remove it but it would come back after I restarted the computer. I got it removed by following some steps from TechSupportGuy.com (this was before I knew about Bob. Sorry Bob!) It was a big pain but it worked. I still use SpySweeper and AVG for anti-virus and havent had any problems since then.

The winantiviruspro2007 is a really malicious program. It seems to learn and when you try to download legitimate antispyware it locks up your pc. At least thats what it did to mine. I finally had to have my hard drive cleaned. I tried every tool I read about without success. I have filed complaints with the FTC and the FBI and the Ohio attorney general. Ohio because thats where bytehosting owned by James Reno one of the scumbags involved in this crime is located. billingnow and vipfares are other sites involved in this scam. These guys should be serving long prison terms and their ill gotten gains confiscated! Evidently this whole scam originates in the Ukraine from winsoftware and innovative marketing.

I also had a problem with ad-ware and malware,my son downloaded the trial version of winfixer and winantiviruspro 2007 and i tried all kinds of removals and nothing seemed to work.i downloaded SPYWARE TERMINATOR its free from their website(the full version) and i also use reg cure(this one costs but its worth it) together and i turn off realtime from SPYWARE TERMINATOR and run reg cure then i turn on realtime for SPYWARE TEMINATOR and run a full scan the first time and then a quick scan the rest of the time (usually once a week )and i do a full scan once every 2 or 3 weeks.i always start the same way.turn off real time protect-run reg cure-turn on raltime -run quick or full scan.spyware is just GREAT a must have.i have a 14 year old son and hes online all day its very safe.