This sort of message doesn’t mean that you ever had a virus running on your computer. You could have downloaded a file that contained a virus and your antivirus removed the file before it could ever cause a problem. Or, a malicious file on an infected web page could have been noticed and dealt with before it caused any problems.

In other words, a “virus detected” message that occurs during normal use of your computer doesn’t mean the virus actually did anything. If you see a message like this, you’re likely visiting an infected web page or downloading a harmful file. Try to avoid doing that in the future, but don’t worry too much.

How to Scan for Malware, Spyware, Ransomware, Adware, and Other Threats

If your computer is behaving badly — whether it’s running extremely slow, web pages are acting weird, or you’re seeing ads showing up in places that you normally wouldn’t, you probably have some kind of new malware on your computer. Spyware will track everything that you’re doing or redirect your search and home pages to places you don’t want to go. Adware will infect your browser and even Windows, and ransomware will try to lock your PC.

Regardless of what the problem is, our first step is always to download and run a scan with Malwarebytes, the single best anti-malware tool on the planet. It’s not an ordinary antivirus product, it’s designed to solve modern threats. It’s the only product on the market that can easily clean up crapware and spyware.

Download, install, and then run Malwarebytes, and then start a scan of your PC. It’s going to walk you through cleaning up your system.

You don’t have to buy a license to clean up your PC, but if you don’t want this to happen again, you probably should, because it will make sure you don’t have this problem again.