ItsGeekToMe.co

Q:  I started programming when we used punch cards and tape drives as big as coffins and a 10K storage filled an 8×10 room. I now have a Golf GPS watch that holds 30,000 golf courses. I have been enjoying your dry humor and knowledge of all things Geek for a number of years. I have two web pages that are hiding out on my old Dell machine and pop up almost every time I log on. I have tried Malwarebytes, WinZip anti-malware, McAfee, Google searches and a few others and I cannot get rid of them. “Molinaderrec.com” and “Apple-greens.com.” McAfee Site Advisor hangs around about 30 Sec each time. Error msg at times. “Could not start. 0xc0000022.” Requesting “Senior Citizen” Geek Tech Support, Please Sir.

– Ivan A.
Niceville, Florida

A: Ah, memories!  The first formal programming school I ever attended in back in 1985 included learning how to create and submit batch jobs using punch cards.  I also went through the era of those large magnetic tapes, and having to go to the computer operations center to pick-up printouts on 14”-wide continuous fanfold paper, some of which could be 5”-6” thick.  Good times.

But, on to business! Let me start out by saying that web pages don’t reside on your local computer, they reside on the web.  So, the pages which you believe are hiding on your PC are more likely being loaded by the browser when it starts.  Assuming you’re using Internet Explorer, you can test this theory by simply clicking on Tools->Internet Options.  On the “General” tab is a list of pages that you want IE to open automatically each time it is launched.  Malware can easily make modifications to this list, which would result in behavior similar to that which you described.  Take a look at this list, and hopefully you’ll find the source of these unwanted page openings.  By the way, I couldn’t find much information on “Apple-greens.com”, but the other site you mentioned has an abysmal reputation in the online community. It is what’s known as a Malicious URL – a site that is obviously up to no good, and I would recommend to all my readers to avoid it like the plague that it is.

I believe the web page problem and the “Could not start” error are related. You’ve obviously tried to clean-off whatever malware installed and/or is using these URLs.  Often times, in attempting to clean malware infections, removal tools succeed in breaking the malware without actually removing it.  This often stops the malware from performing whatever malicious activity the author intended, but results in error messages being generated when the malware fails to function properly (how’s that for ironic?).  The error code 0xc0000022 loosely translates to “An application failed to start correctly” (hence the “Could not start” text) and this is probably coming from broken malware of one form or another.  Finding how and where Windows is attempting to launch this malware can be a real challenge – there is no one right answer that I can give to fix all cases.  About the only things I can recommend are trying some well-known malware removal tools, and if that doesn’t work, either reload the operating system, or take the machine to a professional to be scrubbed.  For the former option, check out the instructions at TinyURL.com/IGTM-0447.