Porn and viruses

[actioncat]

I used to be a frequent visitor to porn sites until very recently, namely youporn and pornhub, as well as certain videos on youtube as well. It's not a habit I'm proud of, and I don't anymore, but I used to encounter frequent pop-ups in spite of adblock software. I'm afraid I might have accidentally clicked on them, or that the sites youporn and pornhub themselves might have infected my laptop. Furthermore, there was a malware scare registered in both sites very recently. Will a regular format of the hard drives help me in this regard, or is there a special way of formatting your hard drives that will ensure that your laptop is free from any infection? I've tried scanning using malwarebytes and some other software and apart from a few adware they didn't show anything in the logs.

Recently, I came across a small popup at the taskbar, and a certain beeping noise could be heard from my laptop.

 

[glamdringfh]

Re-formatting your hard drive and performing a fresh install of Windows will solve any possible problem related to what you mentioned above.

If you really wanted to ensure all data removal you could also look at zeroing out your drive before installing windows again. Here is a free tool to use if you want the security of knowing that NO data from your old installation will be left:

http/www.dban.org/

 

[actioncat]

Thank you for your answer. But do you recommend just a normal format? I use Windows 8.1, so should I simply reset it to factory settings?

I was wondering if there were multiple ways of formatting a laptop.

 

[glamdringfh]

Yes, I personally recommend just a normal re-format.

**Before doing this please make sure to backup any data you want to keep to an external loaction**


**Also be sure to have your current Windows 8 Key available before performing the steps below**

Step by Step Instructions:

To reset your PC

- Swipe in from the right edge of the screen, tap Settings, and then tap Change PC settings.
(If you're using a mouse, point to the upper-right corner of the screen, move the mouse pointer down, click Settings, and then click Change PC settings.)

-Tap or click Update and recovery, and then tap or click Recovery.

-Under Remove everything and reinstall Windows, tap or click Get started.

-Follow the instructions on the screen.

Note:

You'll be asked to choose whether you want to erase data quickly or thoroughly. If you choose to erase data quickly, some data might be recoverable using special software. If you choose to erase data thoroughly, this will take longer but it makes recovering data less likely.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

The only one that can't wipe out is a BIOS infection , which is very rare , be careful with DBAN it wipes the disk to raw mode.

Ar regular clean install with format is usually more than sufficient.