I fell asleep and had my browser open (don't know if that matters) and when I awoke and tried to navigate anywhere a pop up box showed up saying something about I needed to sign in or something and that I should click cancel (I was not at a site requiring any sort of sign in). So I just closed Firefox.

Then I couldnt run it anymore because every time I double-clicked on the Firefox icon to start the program... instead of taking me to my start page (or home page), that same pop up box appeared.

At no time did I click cancel (or anything else for that matter.. I closed the thing out by going into Task Manager and ending the task.

So I just uninstalled Firefox. Then a "shell" of the Firefox icon on the display remained. I was like wtf? So I just I'd delete the icon. No can do. Said I required administrator privilege (even though I am the administrator as this is my personal laptop). Verified administrator privilege and it still wouldn't delete this icon that said Firefox on it. Kept asking if I wanted to keep trying. No thanks.

So I finally say screw it and double click the stupid icon to see what trouble I would get it and a box appeared saying Firefox.exe had moved or deleted yadda yadda and did I want to delete this icon. You bet your ass I do, and voila... this time it disappeared.

I restart the computer... and back on the desktop is that icon. lol. I ran virus scans three times and all came back negative. I did the same routine as above to get rid of the icon, then reinstalled Firefox. All appears to be working normally now (and no more mysterious icon on the desktop... yet). But i remembered that when I restarted the computer I got an unusual (for me) me pop up saying waiting on these tasks to end (I know I had no apps open) and so I thought why not check Task Manager to see if there's something there that might not should be there.

And of course there's all of these tasks and procedures and I don't have a clue as to what might be bad... and then I notice this little green thing beside one of them. I don't recall ever seeing that before. (See screenshots 1 and 2). Does anyone know what that thing means and is it supposed to be there?

ADDED: And now I'm seeing more of those things in the Task Manager. See screenshot 3. So I guess this is normal????

Very, new to W10 but I have the same and I have them off,so that could mean that.

Okay, thank you. I guess I just never noticed them before.

nothing unusual in your first two images. cant say on the second as its not my system.

edit: the little green leaf symbol means the task is essentially asleep or suspended but probably still in memory. win 10 has a weird thing where programs youve finished with often have a hibernative version still using (compressed i think?) memory.

for this reason some older games and programs (along with others) will not shut down properly and chew up ram. i keep resource monitor open to see whats what at least once a day to kill anything that shouldnt be moving (like 50 entries of battle isle andosia for instance).

First thing I done was check TM and see what was running.

Thank you.

I just discovered something interesting... for those tasks with the little green leaf next to it... you can't check their properties. I read something about Windows Shell Experience Host and it said to check it's properties to make sure it was in the right folder to ensure it was legit.. but I can't check it's properties. When I right click on it, properties is grayed. So I tried several other tasks and all of them let me check properties... so then I tried another one with the green leaf next to it... and couldn't check it's properties either. So I guess when they're "asleep" or whatever you can't check their file properties.

That could be a 10 safety feature....(assuming only).

Try Adwcleaner. It gives good results. At least, it used to.

Run malwarebytes.

The behavior you described with the pop-up is suspicious. I would check with the site I'll link below. They're the best at diagnosing and removing browser-jacks.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/

Removing Firefox did not use to remove the Firefox settings. Those settings are what you should have removed, if it still works in the same way it did when my browser was hijacked on Linux.

there windows 10 uwp apps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Windows_Platform basically like the person before it's hibernating using no processing power or disk, at the cost of a little ram usage

as well it was added last year it also tells you when you hover your mouse over it. if you go to details and scroll all the way down you will get the same programs

edit added: it was introduced in the Spring Creators Update Spring Creators Update (April 30 2018)

the leaf and the pop up thing, the leaf has nothing to do with the pop up though

Pretty much this.

Though at a glance, the processes look fine, i don't see anything random, but since i'm not on your PC and using it, that isn't 100% confirmed as OK.

Thanks so much for all of your replies (+1 to all of you).

It _appears_ to be working normally now. I do think that was some kind of virus as that adcleaner thing did find something. quarantined and removed it. Hopefully that was it.

Give it a scan with Malwarebytes Anti-Rootkit. It's very good and easy to use. Just update the database before scanning the system.