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So one of my laptops had a virus recently. I managed to remove it by running my computer in safe mode and then running my Antivirus software (norton). My laptop appears on be running fine now.

Should I feel ok checking my bank account and doing personal business items on it now? Or should I still be worried that a virus is there?

Computer is less than 2 years old. Barely used. Computer was acting funny and slower than usually so I brought it into safe mode and my Antivirus discovered the virus and removed it.

IT_User
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  • How can you make sure you're actually seeing your antivirus and not the virus drawing a replica of it? – André Borie Sep 16 '16 at 01:24
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    Depends on what virus. If it's a stupid virus not sniffing passwords or whatever then even if it is there it's safe to check your bank account. On the other hand you can never be sure that there's no undetected malware on your machine. You could use a LiveCD (Linux) and do your banking there if you trust the LiveCD enough to not contain malware. However, we usually do a complete re-install of a machine once our AV notifies us about malware on machines. Of course, this is easier if you have fully automated installation and is kinda time consuming when you have to do it by hand. – mroman Sep 16 '16 at 07:01

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Basically, in a corporate environment we take the attitude that you can never be too careful. I have seen many viruses that will download and run other viruses. You may have removed the downloader rather than the actual payload. It may have modified or corrupted key system files that Norton can't recover leaving your OS unstable.

Fiksdal
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Nick
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  • Why *only* in a corporate environment? – grochmal Sep 16 '16 at 03:11
  • @grochmal never said only, But its where best practice is typically enforced on me. At home if I got a virus I would probably just settle with a scan and remove out of laziness and convince myself everything was fine. – Nick Sep 16 '16 at 03:20
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Should I feel ok checking my bank account and doing personal business items on it now? Or should I still be worried that a virus is there?

Even if you managed to successfully remove the virus you solved only one problem but another remains probably: Did you solve the problem that a virus could infect your system in the first place? As long as you did not solve this problem too (and there is no indication in your question that you did) it is likely that you'll get another infection which implies that the your current setup and how you use it is not safe enough for online banking.

Steffen Ullrich
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