Since I first noticed CastleCops, I have used the mind-boggling volune of free, volunteered information conveniently available here to clean and to some extent safeguard the computers of all my friends and family (and myself, of course). I'm extending the knowledge of this collaboration of awe-inspiring expertise even to my game guild. World of Warcraft is somehow a target for viruses and such -- without the very well thought-out rootkit fix forum thread I found here addressing someone else's almost identical problem, I'd be playing solitaire right now.

I'm going to keep that PayPal link in mind, for what it's worth to say it; because innumerable HJT log postings and solution replies I've found here have saved me and many people close to me a great amount of frusteration. And the database -- it's wonderful.

Side note -- wrong forum, I hope no one minds, but I won't be hurt if no one replies about it -- I was taking a look through a routine HJT scan after the rootkit removal, and I've found this:

O2 - BHO: (no name) - {598F4775-6FB6-477B-9842-E0426824E077} - E:\DOCUME~1\Jules\LOCALS~1\Temp\~DP3D.dll (file missing)

It has me stumped, but it looks like it's already passed on, so I'm not going to sweat it too hard; I'm just too curious about it to check and fix it now. Please take as a compliment that I'm fairly sure this is the first thing I couldn't figure out on my own here, with the use of the brilliant forum posts and libraries and that handy Google Within CastleCops feature and searches and links and...

Hi Phlarb,

Glad you have put the site to good use

You may like to run through our Malware Removal and Prevention procedure - it should get rid of most nasties on your system, even those you may be unaware of.

It is a sad fact that the most popular sites and applications are the ones most often targeted by the scum that write viruses, trojans and so on. They often do it just for kicks. I'd like to give them their kicks alright.

Welcome Phlarb to CastleCops and thanks for the positive feedback.