Life Is Something Like That: Files hidden and turned into shortcuts by virus?

If you had used your USB drive to copy some files over from a shared computer or a computer at the office/workplace, you may have experienced this: it all seemed all right when you copied the files, but when you went back to your laptop to access your USB drive, suddenly all your files were gone, and all that's left were shortcuts (and of course, a virus, which of course, is hidden). Now, don't worry, because most likely your files are still there - it's just hidden. Note though, that you shouldn't be clicking on the shortcuts in your panicky attempt at finding your files, because it will just activate the virus to inject its "offsprings" into your computer.

So what should you do?

1) Obviously, first thing you do when you insert your flash drive is to run an anti-virus scan. If your anti-virus is updated regularly, the scan will most likely reveal the culprit and prompt you to remove it. So, just remove the virus files, as per the instructions of your anti-virus program.

2) Next, you can safely open your flash drive. If you can't see your files (and you only see shortcuts), that's because they're hidden. Solution: unhide it. For those who still didn't know how:-

For Windows 7:

In the Windows Explorer, on the menu bar, go to Tools > Folder options (if you can't see the menu bar, just press the Alt key once in your Windows Explorer)

Then, in the Folder Options window which appears, go to the View tab, and under "Advanced settings", look for the item "Hidden files and folders" and below it, click to select the option "Show hidden files, folders, and drives". Remember to click OK.

Now, you can see all your hidden files. What do you do next? One way you can go is copying all your files to a temporary folder on your hard disk. Then right-click on the newly-created temporary folder and select Properties. Under the General tab, in the "Attributes" section, uncheck "Hidden". Click OK.