I downloaded an app from a questionable website through a torrent. It worked for a couple of days, then my computer began freezing and displaying strange pink and blue pixel patterns that looked vaguely like skulls. A scan of the original torrent found nothing, but I did not scan the extracted archive before running it.
While troubleshooting in Safe Mode, I used various Command Prompt and PowerShell commands and found detections named "Trojan:Script/Obfuse!MSR" and "Trojan:Win32/SuspMasqueradedRen-PyExe.C." I was unable to back up my files, so I created Windows installation media on a USB drive using another computer and reinstalled Windows.
The installation completed, but the computer froze and restarted during the initial setup. After repeating the setup, the same thing happened, and the strange pixel patterns returned. I'm not sure whether the malware survived the reinstall or whether something else is wrong. What should I do next?
3 Answers
The symptoms may not be malware. Persistent freezes and pink or blue graphical artifacts can also point to a failing graphics card, overheating, bad memory, or another hardware problem. If the same artifacts appear while booting from the installer or in the firmware settings, that strongly suggests hardware rather than a Windows infection. After reinstalling, run a reputable malware scan before reconnecting old drives, and test the hardware if the display problems continue.
A properly performed clean installation normally removes ordinary Windows malware, so the exact reinstall process matters. If partitions were left intact, or another drive or USB device remained connected, something could potentially be reintroduced. Also, the USB installer itself should be recreated from a clean computer rather than the affected machine.
Create the Windows installation USB again using a known-clean computer. On the affected machine, restore BIOS settings to their defaults, disconnect every other internal drive and USB device, and make sure the computer boots from the installation USB rather than the existing Windows installation. During setup, delete every partition on the Windows drive and install to the resulting unallocated space. Do not reconnect other drives until the new installation is stable.
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