Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Nasty Virus

At the end of the 2006, my girlfriend's computer was infected with a new local virus which was very nasty. It displayed a prompt dialog before Windows opened, and then when loading the desktop, it disabled some features, for example, CTRL + ALT + DEL combination, Run button, Log Off button, and even worse, Turn Off Computer button. It also change some text on the start menu, for example My computer has been changed into Baboon's Computer, My Documents into Dokumen Baboon, and Recycle Bin into Baboon Suka Kebersihan. What a strange virus.

It also make your space disappear so fast, since it replace your files into EXE files and makes it hidden (the original file), so all your files were being replaced by EXE files, which has been infected by the virus itself. It also disable some anti virus application, so you won't be able to scan it. This virus also works in Safe Mode, so it makes even harder to remove this virus. Perhaps the fastest way is to re-format the harddrive and install a fresh operating system on it, but before that, i need to save some of her important data.

Luckily, my girlfriend had a Ubuntu CD which i gave here few months ago, so i used it to copy the files into other computer and yesterday, i reformat all of her harddrive and reinstall Windows again. This is when LiveCD Linux distribution like Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Knoppix can come as a hero and it did.

What a bad day to celebrate new year.

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