What to Do if Spyware Doctor Didn't Remove Trojan Infections from Your Computer
Spyware Doctor Detects Trojan Horses
PC Tools Spyware Doctor with Antivirus comes in two flavors - a Starter edition or free version and the commercial version. Both editions can provide up to 95% of real-time protection against Trojans, viruses, worms, spyware, adware, rootkits, potentially unwanted programs (PUPs) and other type of malware. The only limitations in using the free edition is you won’t be able to use some of its extra Intelliguard functions.
A Trojan horses is often used by its creator to steal login credentials and other valuable data such as credit card numbers, name or social security number. Some Trojans have the ability to download additional files that are malicious. Other Trojans will automatically install a rogue program or scareware. If Spyware Doctor didn’t remove Trojan infections, you should use the steps in the following sections of this article.
What to Do if Spyware Doctor Failed to Remove a Trojan Infection
If the real-time protection of Spyware Doctor succeeds in detecting a Trojan infection but it failed to remove the Trojan infection, you need
to use the methods below in order to remove the threats in Windows:
- Open Spyware Doctor with Antivirus and click on “Smart Update”. Install any available updates, especially the detections database.
- Change the settings of the File Guard to checking “All Files and Processes” (see the image at the right). Reboot the computer when prompted.
- Disconnect the computer from the Internet and proceed by running a full system scan.
- If Spyware Doctor continue to detect the Trojan but won’t remove it, note the file and path of the detected Trojan. Ensure that it is not a false detection by doing research about the file. You can check the Internet by using a web-search or send the file for a single file scan using the VirusTotal online scan to determine if the detected file is only a false detection (also known as false positive).
- If VirusTotal scanners did not find infection in the uploaded file, report the false detection to Spyware Doctor via its free support forums.
Spyware Doctor Failed in Removing a Positive Trojan Infection
Not all antivirus or anti-malware can detect all Trojans because some are new, while others are variants. It does not mean that a free edition of antivirus or anti-malware is limited in what they can detect, but there are cases that the antivirus vendors has not released a detection or have not received a sample of the new/variants of the Trojans.
To fix a Trojan infection that Spyware Doctor failed to remove, scan Windows using any of the following free software to scan and remove Trojans, or by using an online virus scanner:
- Ad-Aware Free Internet Security
- EmsiSoft Anti-Malware
- Hitman Pro - Note that Hitman Pro offers a free 30-days trial with full features: to scan and remove detected threats using several antivirus scan engines, such as EmsiSoft, PrevX, G Data, Ikarus, and Dr. Web. The scan is done in few seconds or just a minute only!
- Malwarebytes Anti-Malware
- SUPERAntiSpyware
Important note: Before running a scan using any of the above malware scanners and remover, update the detection signatures and temporary disable the real-time protection of Spyware Doctor with Antivirus that detects a Trojan infection but won’t remove. Keeping the Intelliguard active or enabled can interfere with the removal of the Trojan infection using any of the above security programs or online scanning service.
If the Trojan infection continues to stay in the PC, immediately seek help in removing the Trojan infection in any free security forum that provides free malware removal, such as Aumha.org or BleepingComputer.com.
Image credit: Screenshot taken by the author.
