A USB flash drive works as the most commonly used data storage device nowadays. However, it is easy to be infected by various viruses because you connect it to different devices to transfer files. When you find your USB files turned into EXE files, your USB drive is infected. This post from MiniTool tells you how to recover files from the infected USB drive and how to remove the EXE virus.

What Is EXE Virus

EXE virus is ransomware that will hide your original files and create fake .exe files with the same name as your files. Thus, you may find the USB files turned into EXE files. Once you click to run the EXE files, the virus will be triggered to infect more files.

What’s worse, this virus is able to influence your computer programs, like Task Manager, Windows Registry, and other tools, to decrease computer performance and make it vulnerable to being attacked by other threats.

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How to Show the Hidden Files

Here are two methods for you to find the hidden files in the infected USB drive.

Method 1: Show Hidden Files Using File Explorer

Generally, File Explorer will not show hidden files in order to protect some important system files. Thus, you need to enable the option to unhide files.

Step 1: Press Win + E to open Files Explorer.

Step 2: Change to the View tab and choose Options on the toolbar.

Step 3: On the Folder Options window, switch to the View tab, then select Show hidden files, folders, and drivers in the Advanced settings section.

Step 4: Click Apply > OK to save the change.

change view settings

Method 2: Show Hidden Files Using Command Prompt

Another way is to use Command Prompt. If are familiar with Command Prompt, you are supposed to know this tool can help to modify settings, fix computer issues, zip files, and more. You can run a simple command line to find the hidden files.

Step 1: Press Win + R to open the Run window.

Step 2: Type cmd into the text box and press Enter to open the Command Prompt window.

Step 3: Type cd\ and hit Enter, then you need to type the drive letter of your USB drive and hit Enter to change to the target partition.

change the partition

Step 3: Type the following command lines and hit Enter after each to execute them.

dir /a:-h (This command can show the hidden files on the target partition.)

attrib -h -s /s /d *.* (This command will remove the hidden attributes of files.)

run the command line

After this, you can check whether your files appear on the USB drive.

Bonus Tip: How to Recover Files from EXE Virus

If you still can’t find your files after the above operations, your files are possibly deleted by the EXE virus. Luckily, professional data recovery software, like MiniTool Power Data Recovery, can help you recover files from EXE virus.

MiniTool Power Data Recovery, designed by MiniTool Solutions, is specifically developed to recover files in various situations. You can use it to retrieve lost files due to unexpected formatting, virus attack, human errors, etc. The free edition supports you to make a deep scan to find all deleted/lost/existing files on the target partition and recover 1GB of files without any charge.

MiniTool Power Data Recovery FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

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You can have this software and try to restore missing USB files.

How to Remove EXE Virus from a USB Drive

Since viruses can spread among files and connected devices, you’d better remove the virus once you find it. The EXE virus will be activated once you click on the EXE file. Then it will try to infect your computer and other normal files. Try the following operations to remove the EXE virus.

Firstly, you can run antivirus software to scan the target partition and follow its instructions to remove the suspicious files and applications.

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Then, you can use Command Prompt to remove the skeptical EXE files manually. Type the following command lines and hit Enter after each one to delete the EXE files.

  • taskkill /f /t/im “New Folder.exe”
  • taskkill /f /t /im “SCVHSOT.EXE”
  • taskkill /f /t /im “scvhosts.exe”

Final Words

In fact, the EXE virus will not change your files into EXE files. When you find the USB files turned into EXE files, your actual files are hidden instead. Try the methods mentioned in this post to find your files or recover them with MiniTool Power Data Recovery if they are deleted.

MiniTool Power Data Recovery FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

To protect your files and devices, please do not download suspicious files from untrusted websites and periodically back up files to prevent unexpected data loss.

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