Antivirus issue
Antivirus issue
I thought my PC might have malware because some games were crashing and the browser was running very slowly. I downloaded Kaspersky virus removal tool, which scanned my system and found a "trojan" in system32. I deleted it and followed the instructions to restart. After restarting, the screen went completely blank gray with no windows open. When I tried again, everything worked normally. Could it be that Kaspersky mistakenly removed something important, causing the crash? I didn’t want to reinstall the OS right away because I had many files I didn’t want to back up. I just wanted to keep things as they were.
You might also try Malwarebytes to check for any threats. This advice has been shared on the forums before. If you maintain safe browsing habits and avoid suspicious links, along with using Windows Defender that comes with Windows 10 and 11, you should be okay.
I understand you've tried using Malwarebytes and didn't find anything. Only Kaspersky was effective. The question is whether Kaspersky could have made an error.
Well, without knowing which file it highlighted, it's difficult to determine if it was a false alarm.
It seems to me you are in a difficult situation. You no longer have the file; neither you have the detail of the trojan. Any AV can find false positives, but your real trojan may be in system32 too. Being "I want to know" kind of guy, I would hate to be in your position too.
The milk has spilled. If you are sure there is nothing suspicious left, just keep using the machine until something isn't right. Keep backups of your data.
Before my kaspersky licence expired, I removed it for two main reasons.
First, I stayed updated with the news... that’s all I wanted to say about it.
Second, I became tired of the frequent false alarms, especially when trying to access old game discs. Even logging in and ignoring warnings wouldn’t help me. It even prevented me from reinstalling Diablo 3 from Blizzard.
Now I rely on ESET, which over the past 20 years has been my top choice. It “learns” from previous scans, making it faster with more checks.