Hello,

Seeing the damage that is done, I think it is best for you to re-format your drives and start over. You don't know what modifications were made to the system, and could spend the next few months of your life making things work again. Sometimes it is smart to just start over.

But when you do start over, plan how you are going to stop internet attacks from the start. I have seen machines get hacked into in as little as 10 minutes after being "completed" but before proper patches are installed. A firewall should be the FIRST thing installed after the OS boots up. Have the firewall ready on CD, so that you can boot and install it pronto.

Christian

I agree with Christian. But sometimes people have things that are just about irreplaceable installed. If you're not in that category, then by all means, reformat drive and reinstall windows. AND get that firewall ready.

A format and reinstall when booted from a bootable CD will destroy everything. Most any type of DSL router these days, that is set up to do NAT is sufficient for what you need. Sometimes people still use zonealarm so they can see what is trying to get out. Remember, if you're browsing the Internet and you download something like Malware, normally your firewall won't protect you from that. It's main purpose is to prevent hackers from ever even seeing your machine from the outside. They won't be able to "touch" any of your ports. But if you download something, and it "phones home", then you still have a problem. In that case something like ZoneAlarm will at least alert you that somethings trying to get out and you know something is going on. So although I never do it myself because I don't like these applications running on my machine, you probably should until you really know what's what. Hope that makes sense.