Hard drive gone due to malware

[Galatians220]

My computer is dead temporarily. My husband had been getting, on his laptop, which I'm on now but really don't use, spam from PC Tools. He never opened one, he says; he just deleted them. But somehow, they got hold of a credit card number of mine and charged "services" to me (not to him). A couple of days ago, I got the credit card company to remove the charges. My computer was okay until this morning, when I turned it on and -- nothing.

After I found out about the charge (this is the 5th time I've had my ID stolen in the last 10 years; one was at a doctor's office & another time, when I was mugged), I signed up for TrustedID. However, they do not protect every single credit card one has, only the bank-related ones.

I have an appointment to have my hard drive wiped clean of the damage that PC Tools (malware) has done, but it's not for awhile. Won't have as much access to the Board w/o my own computer.

Anything else to be done? I feel like an idiot because I'm in the legal field & this shouldn't happen. I guess I had myself to blame for the mugging, being 4'10" tall and carrying a purse on a public street...

There'll be more opportunities for mayhem on Tuesday: I have jury duty in Wayne County Circuit Court, right at the "foot" of Woodward Ave. in downtown Detroit. I'll have to be using my walker... Wish I could be packing something hot.

Thanks just for reading this...

Margaret

 

[Edward]

Here's a way to get a functional computer going while waiting for the hard drive.

Set the machine to boot from the optical drive first (CD or DVD drive), not the hard drive first.

Get someone to download PuppyLinux and burn it to a CD for you. Put the burned CD into your optical drive, turn your computer off and then on. It should now boot the Puppy and ignore what is on your hard drive.

A few minutes of setup, and you should be able to access the internet, have a very rudimentary word processing program, and other basic functionality (CD and DVD player, Seamonkey (the old Mozilla) web browser and composer, etc). Once booted, it runs in memory until you shut down the computer, so you can pull it out and use your drive for other purposes (listening to CDs or viewing DVDs, for example. Don't install it on your hard drive, but if your hard drive is still viable at all, it will save your bookmarks and settings for the next session. You'll always need the CD in the drive when you turn the computer on.)

I'm presently using Puppy on this laptop so I don't have to deal with the hassles of Vista.

You may end up wanting to keep it if you don't need Windows based programs, or at least keep it for a backup.

Don't have an optical drive? I think you can run it from a floppy (you may have to use an older version), and I know it will work from a flash drive.

"Save Money - Even if your PC has no hard disk (ex, broken hard disk), you can still boot Puppy via CD or USB and continue working. Old PCs that no longer work with new systems will still work good-as-new with Puppy.
"even allowing you to do magic by recovering data from destroyed PCs or by removing malware from Windows.
"Help your friends suffering from computer malware by booting Puppy and removing malware from their PC (use antivirus that is built-in or can be installed in Puppy). Example - bad Autorun.inf is easily removed by Puppy (Just delete it as well as its companion exe program). If your friend thinks that she has lost data from her corrupted hard disk, boot Puppy and try saving her data!"
Puppy Linux Community - Home

Download Puppy

 

[BJClark]

If you can get iolo system mechanic you can clean your hard drive yourself..

iolo technologies - The PC Tune-Up Experts

They even have a drive scrubber where you can scrub the hard drive to 0's and reinstall everything..they have it on sale through their website at the moment..

iolo DriveScrubber® - Use DriveScrubber to wipe your hard drive clean.

 

[Berean]

Here's a way to get a functional computer going while waiting for the hard drive.

Set the machine to boot from the optical drive first (CD or DVD drive), not the hard drive first.

Get someone to download PuppyLinux and burn it to a CD for you. Put the burned CD into your optical drive, turn your computer off and then on. It should now boot the Puppy and ignore what is on your hard drive.

Good idea. You can do this with any Linux "live CD". The LiveCD List

 

[py3ak]

Your life is always so interesting to read about. It seems that there is never a shortage of events! I hope everything works out well, and the jury duty is less painful than seems likely.

 

[Edward]

Here's a way to get a functional computer going while waiting for the hard drive.

Set the machine to boot from the optical drive first (CD or DVD drive), not the hard drive first.

Get someone to download PuppyLinux and burn it to a CD for you. Put the burned CD into your optical drive, turn your computer off and then on. It should now boot the Puppy and ignore what is on your hard drive.

Good idea. You can do this with any Linux "live CD". The LiveCD List

The advantage of Puppy over many of them is that you don't have to install it to save files, bookmarks, passwords, settings, etc. It will put a small save file on your hard drive (or if you have a read -write cd, you can save onto the CD.) My recollection from playing with Ubuntu is that you either have to install it, or you start from scratch each boot. (And Puppy tiny compared to the name distros - I can turn on my computer and be on PB in roughly 75 seconds. When I was playing with with a Ubuntu bootable disk, it seemed to take about as long to load as Vista.

 

[Berean]

I believe you're right, Edward. I'd forgotten about that Puppy feature.

 

[Galatians220]

Your life is always so interesting to read about. It seems that there is never a shortage of events! I hope everything works out well, and the jury duty is less painful than seems likely.

I'm finally back online, and glad to be!!!

Lost all my pictures, though; lost appellate briefs that might have been of some use in the future; lost letters to friends, medical records, transcripts of legal proceedings, etc., etc.

I was so breathtakingly stupid not to have backed everything up. Oh well.

Did not have jury duty after all... Called the court after 5 p.m. as instructed, could not get through to the recording but finally did. A few minutes later, a real person called and said that the recording was "broke down," but he wanted to inform me that they weren't holding any court proceedings the next day. I said, "Well, that's so nice of you to call," and he seemed a little put off course for a moment.

Yep, Ruben, downtown Detroit at this time of year, with constant gale force winds blowing across the river from Windsor and snow/sleet hitting your face like pellets, is an experience definitely to miss. But I remember Detroit as it used to be, with the windows of the J. L. Hudson Co. (later Marshall Field's, now "Macy's," whatever that's supposed to be... ) all decorated with animated figures at Christmas time. Obviously, nothing lasts forever - or for very long.

Thanks again to all of you for, you know, just everything. I am so blessed to be on the Puritan Board.

Grace, peace and love in our Lord Jesus Christ,

Margaret