spywear filled up my HD!

[lugdunum]

I love my X32 and have about a gig of music and a half gig of pictures, no other big files or programs. THen yesterday, when I booted up I got a message saying my Hard Drive was full and I needed to defrag or do something to recover space. I accepted to do that, but there was almost no improvement. I've looked around and my user file shows "23.2 GB", but when you open it to Desktop, Cookies, Favorites, etc. there are no big files, only My Documents has 1.5 GB (my pictures and music). So I must have some nasty thing eating my HD
Question ........is there anything in the IBM included tools to clean this up, or to even SEE what it is? Any tips would be mucho appreciated. I hate stuff like this.

[egibbs]

A couple possibilities...

If you use System Restore, you may have hundreds (or thousands) of restore points set. They can easily eat up the GBs. Open System Restore and clean up the restore points.

If you use Rescue and Rcovery you may have hidden backups eating space. Open R&R and delete any unnecessary backups.

Go to the Tools Menu in IE and select Internet Options. Click on Delete Cookies, Deletes Files, and choose to Ddelete All Offline Content.

Download a 30 day trial of System Mechanic and run the system cleanup and Spyware tools. Also visit Trend Micro and run their online scanner, download Ad-Aware, Spybot S&D, etc.

If you find trojans (probably will) then you need to think hard about the solution. A trojan allows someone else to control your computer - and there is no telling what they have done while on it. They may have created hidden accounts for themselves, stashed warez on your drive (which could explain the missing space), installed keyloggers to capture your passwords and private communications, etc. You need to consider that everything you have done on that machine is now known to one or more criminals.

The best solution is as follows:

Take the machine offline.
Backup your data to CD.
Wipe the drive. Reinstall the factory contents using R&R.
Reinstall your applications from the original media.
Scan your backed up data files with current AV software, then restore them.
Activate the Windows firewall or install firewall software.
Before going online install all security fixes (from CD if possible).
Keep your AV and spyware software up to date, scan often.
Change all of your passwords - especially online banking or brokerages.
You may want to contact your bank and tell them your credit card info may have been compromised, they may issue new cards.
You may want to pull a credit report to see if anyone has opened accounts in your name that you aren't aware of.
You may want to sign up for a credit monitoring service.
If you keep other kinds of information on the machine (work files, etc.) consider the impact if they have been compromised, and take appropriate steps.

How much of that you do is up to you of course.

Good luck,

Ed Gibbs

[lugdunum]

Thank you, egibbs, for your helpful reply. My system restore and rescue and recovery were all still in the default settings. The system seemed fine. I finally went into settings and unchecked "hide system files" and also enabled file extensions to be shown. THen I went back to "see" what all was supposedly filling up my hard drive and guess what? It wasn't full anymore, showed that I am using 11 GB of my 40GB HD, which is correct.
I have no idea why it showed full and a warning message showed up every time I booted it up.
It's back to running like a top. I have various anti-spyware programs so I was surprised that it might have been spyware. Fortunately, it wasn't, but thank you for your thoughtful suggestions.