21 June 2009
1 HOW TO AVOID VIRUS, SPREADING THROUGH USB DRIVE
USB Security measures in Windows
DON’T GET PANIC ABOUT THE VIRUS ,Try to avoid it
• Virus & worms are easily spread by carrying it on a removable medium such as USB drive, Flash based Mp3 players(Ipods), CD, Floppy
• USB drive is otherwise called as “Flash Drive”,“Thumb Drive”, “Memory stick”, “External USB Hard Disk”.
• Even though we have very good Antivirus, new Viruses are one step ahead than Antivirus
• We cannot restrict USB Drive, but we can avoid spreading of virus & worms through USB Drive.
• So we have to be little bit careful while working with USB Drive,some precautionary steps are follows
STEP 1:
• Don’t allow the USB Drive to Auto Play after plug in, cancel it.
• Go to My computer
• Devices with Removable storage
• Do not Double click the USB Drive
• Note the drive letter assigned to USB Drive as mentioned in the Figure
• Here its E:
STEP 3:
• Go to Start > Run > Type (the drive letter+:)(Here its E:)- Refer the figure shown below
• Click on "OK" button or Hit the enter key
Now you can view the Contents of your USB Drive• Copy the necessary files only, dont use cntrl+A
Repeat the whole steps whenever you are plug in the USB drive. In this way you can keep your Desktop and Laptop free from viruses & worms.
• It may be a time consuming process, but no other way to avoid the virus.
HOW TO IDENTIFY VIRUS AFFECTED USB DRIVE
If you find such a screen after plugging in the USB drive, its a virus affected one.Immediately click on cancel button
If you had already enabled hidden files and folders view, you can see the virus file from an affected USB drive.
While doing the STEP 3: you can find the virus files as shown below
Remember one thing.
Do not doubleclick or autorun a removable storage device (especially USB drive)
If you doubleclick or autorun it the autorun will be executed which will inturn execute the virus file.
To view or enable the hidden files and folders
• Open any folder• Goto Tools > Folder options > click view tab
• Under view tab goto > Advanced settings > Hidden files and folders
• Click radio button “show hidden files and folders”
• Remove check mark “Hide extension for known file types”
• Remove check mark “Hide protected operating system files”
• Click Apply , ok.