Email Generating Virus? Please Help!?

Question:

For the last couple of days, a select number of people have been receiving emails from me. The emails are blank, with the exception of a link to CVS Pharmacy, selling viagra and cialis.



I haven't been sending these emails, and yet they have my name in the "To:" field. These emails are not showing in my sent box either.



The other suspicious thing is that my sent box is completely empty.



I really don't think that anyone has hacked into my account, still I changed my password and it's still happening.



Does anyone know what kind of virus this is? I tried to research it but my wording just isn't coming out right.

Answer:

If you hadn't mentioned your empty Sent box, I'd have said someone was spoofing your email address from someplace else (I just went through a round of that), but that does seem suspicious.



So I recommend some anti-malware scans.



If you have an anti-virus, make sure it has the latest virus definitions and run a scan with it in Safe Mode or Safe Mode with Networking. That often prevents malware from protecting itself. If you don’t have one, many people here swear by AVG (it’s free).



I suggest you also download Ad-Aware Free and Spybot S&D (they’re free), install them, update them and run them, again in Safe Mode With Networking.



Also, turn off System Restore to evict any copies of bad stuff that might be lurking there.



To get into Safe Mode or Safe Mode with Networking:



1.Log out and reboot your machine.

2.When the machine starts the reboot sequence, press the F8 key repeatedly.

3.Select Safe Mode or Safe Mode with Networking from the resulting menu.

4.Login. If the malware has changed your password, try logging in as Administrator. By default, Administrator has no password.

5.The machine will continue booting, but the Windows desktop will look different.

6.When you're finished doing what you need to do, log out and reboot back into normal mode.



Note that even if the anti-malware programs get rid of the malware, they may not be able to reverse the effects. Search the Web for possible fixes.



Update and run everything regularly, not just when you think you already have malware.



Good luck. Source(s): Note: There ARE free versions of these programs on the websites listed. They just may not be obvious.



Ad-Aware Free (free): http://www.lavasoftusa.com/

Spybot S & D (free): http://www.spybot.com/



AVG anti-virus (free): http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/lng/us/tpl…

Avast! (free): http://www.avast.com/

Kaspersky (free trial) (Seems to dislike installing on any machine with just about any other decent anti-malware, including some firewalls.): http://usa.kaspersky.com/downloads/

MalwareBytes (free) http://www.malwarebytes.org/