USB Flash Drives are now the most popular data transfer facility since it enables fast transmission and file sharing from computer to another. Although using USB flash drives may take down your computer with Viruses infection and you may be a victim of this vulnerability. The USB flash drives can be easily infected with viruses (especially Autorun.inf viruses, trojans, Rats...) and you can't do anything with that problem, so I'm writing this article about How you can Protect your USB Flash Drive from Viruses and make your computer more Secure when using those USB keys.How your USB Flash Drive is Infected?
While using the USB flash drive to transfer data between computers, it may catch different types of viruses like Trojans, Rats, Worms, Autorun.inf... you cannot see how & when the virus is copied to USB flash drive, because it works & spread silently. So when it's connected to an Infected PC the virus is directly transmitted to the USB, then the virus will do one of the following infection methods:
1)The virus creates 2 Files: Autorun.inf & Worms Viruses
- Autorun.inf : It auto-executes the virus simply when you double-click the USB drive in your computer.
- Virus.exe or Virus.com : This is the virus which will be executed by the Autorun.inf, it's always a .Exe .Com or .Pif file, so it will be executed as a normal file.
2)The virus will infect any Files in the USB: Rats & Trojans
- The virus will start exploring and running through all the Files existing in the USB flash drive and start infecting them with itself ( binding the files ), and after you try to open any of the programs in your flash drive, your computer will get infected by the virus and it will starts the destruction.
How to Protect USB Flash Drive from Viruses
If you are suffering from the above 2 types of infections, then you can apply the following 3 Tricks to Protect your USB & Computer from malware, spyware or any other infections.
1) Using USB Flash Drive Antivirus
You can install one of the best USB Antivirus protection software to protect your computer from different attacks. When you plugin the Flash it starts analyzing all it folders and sub-folders for common types of possible attacks.
Top USB Flash Drive Antivirus:
2) Scan for USB Viruses Manually using CMD
You can also manually scan for Autorun.inf using the Command Prompt from Windows, by this method you can search for Autorun.inf and delete it to protect your USB drive. Here's how you can do it:
- Press Windows + R and type CMD to open the command prompt.
- Now type your USB drive letter (you can find it on Computer) followed by Autorun.inf example: F:\Autorun.inf
- Press Enter , if a new Notepad window is opened then you have to proceed to step 4, else your USB is not infected.
- If you found an Autorun in step3 then type the following command: del /a/f/s F:\Autorun.inf and replace F:\ with your drive letter/
3) Write Protect USB Drive
With this method you can protect your USB drive from writing, means that no one can copy files to it even viruses cannot make changes to your flash drive. And you can only read files easily. Here's the top software to use to Write Protect USB Drive:
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