Need advice about External HD and Win32:Virut virus

Viruses and worms
1

My laptop recently went nuts with a Win32:Virut that was not stopped or detected with Bitdefender. Not knowing what was going on a backed up a lot of files onto an external hard drive and a flash drive and reformatted and reinstalled XP on the laptop. I installed Avast and transferred my files back from the external drive. I must have brought infected exe files over to the external and then back on to the newly re-installed laptop. Thinking a harmless looking exe file that triggered Avast must have been a false positive I ignored it. Needless to say, I’m all messed up again and in the process of re formatting the laptop again.

The thing is I’m worried about the External drive. What is a good way to check it out and fix any problems and get my important data off it without exposing it to my other computer or with the newly formatted laptop and possibly infecting it?

Thanks for any advice.

2

Virut is a file infector:

Viruses belonging to this family infect files with .EXE and .SCR extensions. All viruses belonging to the Virut family also contain an IRC-based backdoor that provides unauthorized access to infected computers.

http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/virus_w32_virut.shtml

Basically don’t touch any files with the extension above.

Make sure you have “show file extensions for known file types” just in case you have a file called virus.txt.exe, for example, otherwise it will appear to be virus.txt. (The real name would be something innocent, obviously, not “virus”.)

http://www.fileinfo.net/help/windows-show-extensions.html

3

Try this tool, DrWeb CureIt! - See http://www.freedrweb.com/cureit/ - Download ftp://ftp.drweb.com/pub/drweb/cureit/launch.exe (Free) Fairly effective against file infectors, Virut, more so when used in safe mode.

4

So I can plug it in and scan the external drive without infecting more files? Is it the clicking on the infected exe files that activates them or moving and copying them as well?

5

Make sure you have autorun disabled before you plug it in, just in case there’s a script on the disc to run the malware:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/953252

(If you really want autorun to work, you can turn it back on later.)

Moving and copying won’t activate an infected file.

6

Thank You.

7

Hi

I’ve had issues with the “Virut” virus family. You see, i always keep my files on a external HDD. and now thats infected. i’ve managed to fix some .exe files (cos their homebrew apps/opensource).

some files i cannot get rid of because i dont have the original (GTA vice and i think the WD auto backup.)

Please may some one help.

(note:i’ve had plenty of expirence in computing so how ever complex the virus removel is, i still beable to remove it.)

Druv