folders showing as shortcuts. files contained within are inaccessible

Anonymous
2010-07-10T17:00:20+00:00

Original title: All my folders have turned into shortcuts and I cannot access files within

Hi there. I wonder if someone can help me with a problem.

An my computer every folder has now turned into a shortcut and I cannot access the files that are located within. Once I click the folder I jts get a message saying 'The item 266986688.vbs that this shortcut refers to has been changed or moved...' and then it asks if I want to delete. On right-clicking the drives I can see that the files are still there and they also show up being scanned with Kaspersky Antivirus, but I cannot access them in any other way. I have scanned it with several virus programs and it didnt find much, even tried the scan in safe mode. I also have an external hard drive connected and that is also affected in this way.

I really dont know what happened, I didnt download anything today and didnt alter any settings, it was just fine one min and then went all strange. Can anyone offer any ideas at all?

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Files, folders, and storage

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Anonymous
2010-07-21T06:27:20+00:00

·        I had the a variation of this problem, which was caused by the program CIEUHU.EXE. it sucked.... basically what it did was change all folders on my flashdrive to shortcuts, but the drive still showed that it had data. The fix for this is was relatively easy for me and I hope it works for you.

  1. Go to control Panel, Folder Options -- select VIEW--- select Show hidden files and folders and uncheck Hide protected operating system files (recommended) now click APPLY
  2. go to your folders and it should show you all your folders hidden including the virus----- delete the virus and all the shortcut folders that have no data in them. create new folders and copy the data from YOUR hidden folders into them. once that is done delete the old hidden folders.
  3. enter task manager--- find the program that is still running which will have the same name as the one you just deleted off the hard drive---- right click it and select open file location---- this should show you the virus location---- delete it!
  4. return back to control panel, Folder options select view----- select DO NOT show hidden files and folders and recheck Hide protected operating system files (recommended)
  5. Restart computer---- open task manager and ensure that the program is no longer running

This worked for me and I hope it works for you. As I said mine affected external media. Good Luck

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-03-09T13:28:02+00:00

    Thank you so very much! It worked.

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-03-16T09:13:56+00:00

    I know this is old, but I recently had a virus do the same thing to one of my drives, so thanks for the advice.

    In fact, the folders are just tagged as system and hidden, so I reset them from the command prompt by typing the following command for each folder.

    attrib -s -h [Folder Name]

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-04-04T13:08:04+00:00

    I've got the same problem, but I can't find The virus CIEUHU.EXE in my pc. Does the virus also have a different name, or is there virus with the same effect?

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  4. Anonymous
    2013-04-04T13:22:10+00:00

    Hello jaaphesselink,

    Before you try to fix the folder issue, you need to remove the virus that caused it; however I wouldn't go looking specifically for the name of the exe. I recommend that you download a general malware/spyware/virus cleaner.

    Two malware cleaners that I use (a belts and braces approach) are SuperAntiSpyware and Malware Bytes.  I launch one of them, scan and clean the PC, reboot and repeat the process with the other one.

    When the system is clean (and you have an antivirus solution in place of course :) ), then you can fix the folder issue as described in this thread.

    Hope that helps.

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