[PLUG-TALK] Killing Zombie in M$ Body

[Rich Shepard]

   My sister's desktop computer runs some flavor of Windows. She has a
McAffee subscription and lets the company install all the upgrades they ask
to install. Despite this, her machine's been turned into a spam zombie.

   Twice in the past week I and others in her address book received spam
promoting a Canadian web site where one can buy the popular
quicker-dicker-uppers.

   She (and a friend in Reno whose computer is similarly infected) both have
their mail processed by yahoo.com. My suggestion to both was to drop that
account and get a gmail account. In my sister's case, I also suggested
comcast.net since she pays them for telephone, television, and 'Net access.

   I assume that some of you have encountered similar spam from users who had
no idea their systems had been compromised. Is there something we can do to
clean up her system?

   I'd offer to replace the OS with a 'buntu, but her quilting software runs
only on Windows, she's indifferent about computers (uses it lightly), and I
don't need the extra support issues (particularly connecting with comcast
from linux as I've no experience with this.)

   Suggestions?

Rich