receiving messages that downloads are needed from the following sites

[shyman]

I have HP Pavilion laptop which is running on Windows XP and due to some issues have done a destructive recovery on it. After that I am continuously receiving messages that are telling me downloads are needed from some sites. I dont know whether those are valid microsoft websites or not, but I dont want to take any risk, can anyone tell me why am i getting that message?

[agarwalm11]

You should not click on any websites that do not begin with the www.microsoft.com and it is the only trusted site from where you can get list of downloads for software and drivers. I think that you have enabled the service messenger in your laptop and therefore getting those kind of messages to download stuffs.

[jesse]

Have you installed HP patches before installing Service Pack 2, if not then you will need to connect to the internet without a firewall and therefore you could have got some malware infection. So, you should first of all get the HP patches and then install the Service Pack 2. After that you can also install some antivirus software like Norton or AVG and fully scan your pc to remove all the nasties. Then with the Service Pack 2 installed, turn on the firewall as well to surf the internet.

[Reegan]

Yes, even I agree that, this unexplained Windows or software behavior may be caused by deceptive software, such as spyware that is known as "grayware," is installed on your computer. This kind of software may come bundled with software that you want to install or may be included with downloaded web components. So to solve this kind of an issue you can go to this link and follow the steps given their - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/827315