Unhidden Files Hidden By Viruses

Solution 1

The Problem:
It is really annoying when notice that your files were missing from your thumb drive. You might thought the files were already gone because of a virus attack or accidentally deleted. But actually the files were there but a virus has hidden all the files inside the thumb drive.

Although sometimes you might try to "Show Hidden Files" using Folder Options in the Control Panel but the virus does not allow you to view them. Luckily, there is a solution to overcome this problem.

The Solution

1. Insert the thumb drive to an empty USB slot. Take note the drive letter. For an example, F:

2. Press Windows + R, and type "cmd". Then Click OK.

3. Enter this command, attrib -s -h -r f:/*.* /s /d , where f: is the is the thumb drive drive letter

4. Press Enter and wait for the command to execute.

5. Open the thumb drive and you should see the files that were hidden by the virus.

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Solution 2

The Problem:

Sometimes a virus or some malicious script makes the hidden files and folders not visible even when it is explicitly enabled.

In this case even if the user enables the Show hidden files and folders in

Tools > Folder options > View menu, Hidden files and folder does not become visible.

Lets see how to fix it.


The Solution:

First and foremost is the point that the user has enabled the Show hidden files and folder

1. Go to Tools > Folder options. This will show a folder options menu.

2. Go to View tab and select the option “Show hidden files and folder”

The hidden files and folders are displayed by this method normally. But in case some virus or script is preventing the hidden files and folders from being visible, follow the below steps:

1. Go to your Start > Run, type regedit and press enter. This will open registry editor.

2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folde r\Hidden\SHOWALL

Note:

DELETE the value CheckedValue in the right window if it already there and type is REG_SZ

Now create a new DWORD value again with the same name CheckedValue.

3. Double click the value called CheckedValue, and modify its data value (DWORD Value) to 1 (0×00000001) . Close registry editor after this.

If still folder options is reverted back to don’t show hidden files and folders then it could be due to some virus still in action.

Navigate to the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folder\Hidden
NOHIDDEN

In the NOHIDDEN folder, select CheckedValue and set the value to 1

4. Go to Tools > Folder options. This will show a folder options menu.

5. Go to View tab and select the option “Show hidden files and folder”

The above fix to the trouble came from one of our readers Chris under a virus post comment.

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Solution 3

The Problem:

The issue here is that hidden files were not showing up in my PC even if you enabled the show Hidden Files checkbox in the Folder Options dialog box. If you edited various values in the registry, but you weres not able to solve the problem. Then you should do the following steps:

The steps are :

1. Open registry (select run command from start menu and type regedit and then press enter)
In the left pane goto path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftware\Microsoft \Windows \CurrentVersion \Explorer \Advanced \Folder \Hidden \SHOWALL

2. Delete the value CheckedValue in the Right pane by right clicking it and selecting delete. (Its type should be REG_SZ and data should be 2.)

3. Create a new DWORD value called CheckedValue by right clicking in the Right pane and then selecting new -> DWORD Value and then changing the name to CheckedValue. (same as above, except that the type is REG_DWORD). Modify the value data to 1 (0×00000001) by right clicking the CheckedValue in the Right pane and selecting modify and changing the value data to 1.
This should let you change the “Hidden Files and Folders” option.

Why this happens? The fact that the hidden files were not showing up was due to virus which would have changed the value in the registry and the virus may be still present. Even when the virus was removed the old value may not have been restored in the registry.

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Solution 4

The Problem: How To Restore Files Hidden by Virus on Windows 7

Some virus do hide file and folder in flashdisk (thumb drive) that connected to a computer or laptop infected by virus. And then we tried to scan the flashdisk using antivirus program. We are very happy because antivirus can detect and remove virus in the flashdisk, but it doesn’t return our files and folder hidden by the virus. I hope the virus did not delete the files, just make it hidden. If your files was deleted by virus, we need a tool to restore files. If the files was hidden, we need to restore our files manually using command prompt.

This solution is for Windows 7 user.
Virus has modified the attribut of folders and files to be hidden. So, we will try to modify the folders and files attribut to restore.

1. Open command prompt from START MENU > RUN. Type CMD and hit enter. Go to the drive, for example your flashdisk (thumb drive) is on drive E. Type “e:” and enter.
The command we use to restore files is ATTRIB.

2. Type this command :  attrib –s –h *.* /S /D and then hit enter.

3. Finished. If you want the easier way to restore your files, you could use Smadav Antivirus. It can detect hidden files in your flashdisk and restore them.