It is disappointing to see your USB flash drive or memory card Folders changed to Aplication .exe format. Its a virus/worm that infected your storage device. This worm will duplicate all your folders creating an executable files with its name(example: my music folder will be duplicated with my music.exe). In this situation original folders will become hidden. This type issue occurs when you insert your USB storage drive to a virus infected computer.
To Avoid this problem you should regularly update your antivirus via internet. You shouldn’t attach your USB storage device on any computer without knowing antivirus status on that computer. Here I will explain you some ways to avoid this type issue.
Solution for Folders changed to Aplication .exe on usb drive or memory card:-
1. Install and update your antivirus application. I used AVG free to find virus Worm/Autoit.ANVE (Make sure to do Computer virus Free otherwise it will affect again)
AVG Updated and showing “You are protected Now”
2. Right Click on Storage Drive then choose scan With AVG Free. Delete all detected files by moving to virus vault . It will remove the .exe folder. Now you need to show the original folders.
3. In next step go to My Computer and then Open Drive (my drive name is h:).
4. After it go to top menu, Tools > Folder Options. Select View tab, if you have windows 7 then Click on Organise>Folder and Search Options then Click on View as shown Below
all folders become exe
5. Mark the “Show hidden files and folders.”
6. Go to Start > Run, type cmd at the OPEN: box, and press OK. This will show the DOS command prompt
7. Opening My Computer drives view the drive of hidden folders
8. Go to Command Prompt and type this to unhide all folders and files:
attrib h:*.* /d /s -h -r -s
here “h” is the drive where hidden folders resides. Replace your drive letter with h in above code to run it.
How to Avoid problem of Folders changed to Aplication .exe from your USB Storage (flash drive, memory card and portable HDD)
- Keep updated your windows Defender or Microsoft Windows Essentials .
- Keep updated your Antivirus software virus database from antivirus server.
- Check your antivirus status, whether it is working or not.
- Before entering your USB device on another users computer check computers antivirus status as mentioned above.
- Regular Scan your Windows Computer with updated virus database.
Always keep in mind that installing a antivirus doesn’t mean that your computer became virus free. To make your computer virus free, regularly scan your computer with antivirus software. Before scanning check your antivirus virus definition update over internet. If you have Genuine windows then Microsoft provides security software free of cost. You need to update Microsoft Security software regularly and set scheduled full scan on your computer as it remove viruses. See the Images Below with updated definitions on Microsoft Security Essentials, it helped me to avoid changing folders to exe.
Follow above steps to remove and avoid viruses from your computer.