Reinstalling Office 365?

simrick said:

Hmmm.....what store?

She didn't say.

simrick said:

Just thinking - did they identify what infection it was she had?
Sorry, I don't trust too many places to know what they're doing. I've seen shops clean a computer, and then never delete the infected restore points. Just sayin'.

Good point. It would never have occurred to me to delete the infected restore points so it may not have occurred to them either. I'll have to ask her when I speak to her tomorrow.

My friend's computer has 64-bit Windows 10 on it so I installed 64-bit on the computer; I'd completely forgotten your advice to install the 32-bit version until I came back to this thread to mark it solved. Is that going to be a problem?

By the way, as I've outlined in a post I just added to the forum, I had some issues with installing just the Office parts that she wanted: Word, Outlook and Excel. I couldn't see any options for just those apps so I installed all of Office 365. Could that be because I downloaded the 64-bit version??

I forgot to mention that I removed her McAfee; she was disappointed that it hadn't detected/prevented the malware she picked up. So I removed McAfee (via the McAfee Removal Tool, not by a normal uninstall) and installed Avast Free and ran the Smart Scan, which came up clean. I also installed MalwareBytes and told her to run it whenever she suspected that Avast had not found anything but she still thought there might be a problem. (I warned her to update the MalwareBytes database before she ran the scan.)

I also asked her what store she had used to clean off the virus; it was a local standalone store, not part of a big chain like BestBuy. She said the guy had been here for ages so she figured he'd be okay. I've never dealt with that store so have no idea how good or bad he was.

simrick said:

Good that you used the removal tool - that's always the best method. What does that mean "she still thought there might be a problem"?

Sorry, that didn't come across clearly. I was trying to say that I installed MalwareBytes for her as something to run if she ever had any doubts about Avast having found all problems. I explained to her that no anti-malware programs was absolutely 100% accurate in catching all problems every time so that it was a good idea to have something like MalwareBytes for those cases where you had doubts about your main program's success in finding malware: then you could run the second program to verify that nothing had (likely) been missed by the main program. I also told her to not run two such programs at the same time as they can clash: she needed to finish the first program's scan first, then update the database definitions of the second, then run the second to get the best results.

Well, if you want to do some checks, let me know.

Can you give me the instructions for what you are proposing? Please don't be offended but I'm not comfortable with recommending that she allow you on her computer. I simply don't know you well enough. You seem benevolent enough but I'm cautious enough not to take that at face value.

simrick said:

Oh right - got it. Actually, the best approach is a layered one. Avast is an anti-virus, while MBAM is an anti-malware - two different animals. You are correct that only one scan should be run at a time, but MBAM finds things that an AV won't.

Exactly. That's what I was trying to say although I did a fairly poor job of it ;-)

I never suggested a remote session. You don't know me from Adam!
But I can make some recommendations for additional one-time scans, although it's always better if you know what you're dealing with, as there are different scans for different infections. But, I could make some general recommendations:

Create a restore point - call it "Begin Scans"

RKILL
RKill Download
Download @ Bleeping Computer

ADWCleaner
Downloads - AdwCleaner - ToolsLib
Scan, post log, determine what should be cleaned and what should not (system will require a reboot to clean).

JRT
Junkware Removal Tool Download

ESET Online Scanner
Free Virus Scan | Online Virus Scan from ESET ESET
Choose Scan Now.

Create another restore point - call it "Clean"

Open Ccleaner Free and delete any other restore points that remain besides the two you made.

Feel free to post logs if you want an evaluation.

Thank you for the list of actionable suggestions

She told me yesterday that the malware which prompted the whole incident had something to do with Ransomware. I'm not sure of the specifics but she was seeing something about ransomware somewhere on her computer and knew that was very undesireable. She cursed McAfee for letting it get on there, then took it to the local computer store for a cleaning. After she got it home and tried to turn it on, it was initially unresponsive in some way so she texted me for help since the computer wasn't immediately functional. But while I was trying to understand the problem via text, she got it to boot up again and got email functionality back. Then I started to piece together what had happened and started this thread to understand how to get the Office software back on the computer.

Does the ransomware aspect change your recommendations at all? Or should I proceed as you've suggested? She *has* run the Avast Smart Scan and it found nothing except for some performance tweaks. (I chose the free version but it installed the premium version for a 13 day trial anyway!).