[Perineum]

Originally Posted by LaughingCrow

Yes. Known to be true. Some of Google's banner ads were known to carry virus some time ago (can't recall offhand). Some of these work via the PDF vulnerability. There's a lot of people who just don't know anything technical about computers and the Internet and they fall victim to the fake anti-virus testers, phishing, etc...

And even if you're well informed, the bad guys know one thing - they only have to succeed once where a security system has to be perfect 100% 24/7

Here's a link about an ad from Facebook that carries a virus:
Attention: New Facebook Virus Spreading Via FarmTown Ads – SoftSailor

Sneaky New Virus Spreads via Ads - PCWorld

and an ad from November 2009 on the New York Times:
New online virus threat comes via banner ads - Monsters and Critics

Hey, thanks for this!

It seemed to be the only common denominator between all the events so I had a hunch I never followed up on.

Originally Posted by Killswitch

If I were, you I'd back up anything you might have that's important now that things are running "normal", and do a complete format and re-install of your OS. But that's just my opinion..... I'd feel dirty running a PC that just had a virus removed. Think of having a girlfriend that "had" syphilis earlier today, but now she doesn't. Yuck. Do over!

I think that's a bit overkill. Once you've got the main (or main 2 or 3) executable(s) the virus is disabled. Your A/V will pick up the stragglers over the next few weeks as it updates.

I've never had a problem.

Most people are uninteresting enough that bad people aren't going to do some custom job in order to backdoor their machine in a way that a virus checker isn't going to be able to clean up.

Also, you're free to read up on the virus and learn how it works....