They were amusing to listen to. They popped up from who knows where? Their invasion happened about nine years ago. You've heard them in English, but maybe have not had the experience of relishing these audio sounds in Spanish!

What do you do when you boot up your laptop / PC, switch on speakers, and out comes non-stop ads for U-S American branded fast food chains and soda pop?

Please don't say "you turn off the audio!"

This happened to me. I was lucky. The offending intruder didn't do anything more malicious. Did I mention that all of the ads were spoken in Spanish? I wasn’t in Spain or Mexico. I was in Alexandria, Virginia.

It was humorous entertainment for about 5 minutes, but the interloping audio could not be silenced. I'd restart or turn off the PC, cycle it on again, turn on the speakers, and get assaulted one more time by more hideous audio ads.

How this 'app' got through the firewall, malicious software removal tools, and the defender antivirus I will never know.

A high performance power wash

After trying several hard drive cleansing solutions over several days without success, I gave the Malwarebytes app a try. The company Malwarebytes currently bills its software as the "#1 malware removal and protection software." They claim to provide "Cyber protection for everyone."

Using their tool, a rootkit was discovered on my drive.

The company says "rootkits are a kind of malware that can give a threat actor control of your computer without your consent or knowledge. Rootkits are particularly dangerous because they are designed to hide their presence on your device."

Even with my experience, I was not able to detect the rootkit without using the Malwarebytes solution. Malwarebytes did its job, removed the rootkit, and put the serenade of Spanish language audio ads to bed.

Their software is one tool I've been using ever since this event occurred.

Trust, verify, or pass on online file converters?

Here's another tip. I never use online file converters. You should be very careful with them. Pieter Arntz, a Malware intelligence Researcher with Malwarebytes Labs unpacks all of this in his article a Warning over free online file converters that actually install malware. (You'll go to the Malwarebytes website).