Warning--this is going to probably be a long post. Sorry about that, but I have several questions that I hope all of you tech-savvy people will advise me about (particularly glb613 and gardenman).
Yesterday when I was on the ehow.com website (which is, supposedly, a safe site, though I guess no such thing really exists nowadays), a new little window opened up within the now blank bigger window where the ehow page had just been and had one of those infamous messages claiming that my computer was infected with a virus. (The little window had something at the top indicating that in was from Internet Explorer--right!) I tried to click on the red "x" to close out the little window--it just reappeared. Then I tried clicking on the "x" on the bigger window, same thing. Next I hit alt + F4 to close the browser. No effect. So, finally, I just hit the power button and shut it down. Upon rebooting, I ran the free edition of malwarebytes that I already had installed and nothing was found. After doing that, I recalled reading that one really should run a scan in safe mode. So, I put the computer into safe mode, ran malwarebytes again, and nothing was found. I also ran my Norton Internet Security in safe mode and, again, came up with nothing (obviously Norton didn't do its job by allowing this window to pop up in the first place). I believe everything is OK, but wanted to get other opinions.
Something I've always wondered about concerning when something like this happens is whether or not you should try, as I did, to click on the red "x" to close the window. I know not to click on the "fix it now" button (or whatever wording they use) or even the "cancel" button, but I really don't know if clicking the "x" could open you up to more infiltration by the virus. I'm guessing that you're probably better off just powering the computer down as I finally ended up doing. Would love to know exactly what the best thing is to do.
Also, I'd like to know if the virus has already infected your computer right when you get one of these windows, or if it would only infect if you click on one of the buttons (fix it or cancel). I've read different opinions about this.
And, finally! I've never used safe mode before and wanted to ask if I chose the right option when I ran the scan. After hitting F8, the screen showed the following three choices: Safe Mode, and then under that, there was Safe Mode with Networking and Safe Mode with Command Prompt. I have no idea what the last two choices are about, so I just selected Safe Mode and ran the scan. Should I have selected one of the other choices ( Networking or the Command Prompt)?
If any of you have actually stuck it out and made it all the way to the end, bless you! I hope someone out there will get back with me on all of these questions. Thanks ahead of time to anyone who will take the time to respond.
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