How to remove autorun.inf from USB Drive

Worms spreads by creating a copy of itself and starts by autorun.inf files. It is essential to remove the malicious and autorun.inf files not only from computers but also from the source, and that is the USB Drive. PreciseSecurity have created a procedure to delete the malicious files on infected drives.

PROCEDURE:

1. While the computer is still off;

2. Plugin the USB Drive

3. Insert the Windows XP CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive. It must be the bootable Windows XP Installer

4. Start the computer from the CD-ROM drive. It will start Windows Setup screen

5. When the “Welcome to Setup” prompt appears.Press “R” to start the Recovery Console


6. If asked “Which Window installation would you like to logon to” select the number. Type “1? then Enter, if only one installation of Windows is present

7. Enter the administrator password, press Enter

8. It will bring you to command prompt, C:\Windows>

9. Proceed with the following command:
- Type d: (This is the drive letter of USB. It can be e: or f: defending on how many hard disk or cd drive is installed)
- Type attrib -h -r -s autorun.inf
- Type “edit autorun.inf” it will open DOS Editor and display contents as follows

==========================
[autorun]
open=file.exe
shell\Open\Command=file.exe
shell\open\Default=1
shell\Explore\Command=file.exe
shell\Autoplay\command=file.exe
==========================

Take note on the file that it called to open (in above example it is file.exe)

10. Exit DOS Editor and return to command prompt, D:\>

11. Delete the file that was called to open on DOS Editor
- Type del /f /a file.exe

12. Delete autorun.inf file
- Type del /f /a autorun.inf

13. Exit Recovery Console by typing exit.