I haven’t been using Windows as my main OS for years, but I’ve still been tasked with helping friends and family members with their Windows machines from time to time. Now, I’m a graduate student studying computer security and I find it incredibly difficult to clean up a windows machine that’s been infected with an unknown number of malicious programs. I can’t imagine that it’s much easier for anyone who doesn’t spend the amount of time studying computer security.

A few years ago, I simply gave up and started recommending re-installing Windows as the first course of action. Until now, it’s been difficult to find much in the way of expert opinion to justify this. My mom in particular finds it truly exasperating that I refuse to try and save her from re-installing all her programs and data from backups. Of course, we all should be backing up our data regularly anyhow, right?

Now I have a place to direct my friends and family to justify this advice. There’s a fantastic article by Brian Krebs of the Washington Post about whether or not you should attempt to clean-up a Windows machine bogged down with viruses, spyware and other malware or simply re-install. I highly recommend this article both to people who are in my situation and those who don’t understand why they are being advised by computer savvy folks to simply reinstall.