I'm currently fixing the computer of a family member who just fell for the "I'm from Microsoft and let me take control of your computer please" phone scam. The computer is an old Core 2 Duo running on Windows XP.
I already removed pretty much all of the nasty stuff (AdWares, remote control applications etc.) but there's one thing I can't get rid of.
When booting, the computer looks clean for some time, a few minutes to an hour, then out of nowhere, a bridge connection appears in the bottom right taskbar. It just says "Internet Connection". Whenever I click on it to see the status window, I see it for a split second and it disappears. Also, I just can't do anything about it in the Control Panel, everything I try just does nothing. Also, I tried booting in safe mode to see if I could do more, but it doesn't appear, and never pops up (I only see the usual LAN connection).
I ran all kinds of tools on it to scan for threats but so far nothing worked. Is this a case of nuke it from orbit? If not, what could I do to fix it?