Wtf Hal 32!?!

[Plaid.exe]

Has anyone heard of this shit?
A friend of mine was attacked by a bug called 'HAL32'.
Quote: "*slams head*
ok...i got the hal 32 thing. it mimics a virus but it is not nor is it a trojan or worm. it corrupts your files and changes its address. my hard drive was wiped and it is still corrupting stuff. i am using my back up drive. my comp tech will be running my main drive through the FBI scan thing and that will take two days so at least."
I've never heard of this thing, and don't know what to tell her..
Furthermore, she says that virus scans don't pick it up...
Does any one have any info on this thing?
How can we protect our selfs from it?

 

[vampist]

I did some searching didn't see any "hal32 virus"...

From the sound of it.. Your friend doesn't know much about computers.
What that thing did what ever it was, could very well have been a "virus".

If this is about the hal.dll file in any way.. that is just the Hardware Abstraction Layer dynamic link library file Windows loads on start up. Can be fixed with Windows install cd-rom.

 

[berry120]

I did some searching didn't see any "hal32 virus"...

+1. Either this is some new and awful thread we're all about to be faced with, or you're mistaken - if you've never heard of it and no virus scans are picking it up, then how on earth have you come up with its name?!

Though to be honest, when faced with a serious virus / worm these days, I just wipe, reinstall, copy all my important files over and be done with it. Yes I could spend a week trying to get rid of the thing, or I could spend an afternoon doing something I know will fix the problem, and get me a squeaky clean installation to boot

 

[cboucher]

Though to be honest, when faced with a serious virus / worm these days, I just wipe, reinstall, copy all my important files over and be done with it. Yes I could spend a week trying to get rid of the thing, or I could spend an afternoon doing something I know will fix the problem, and get me a squeaky clean installation to boot

The best advice for dealing with a virus, ever...

 

[TitanMATRIX]

ok...i got the hal 32 thing. it mimics a virus but it is not nor is it a trojan or worm. it corrupts your files and changes its address.

It does all that and it just "mimics" a virus? Definitly sounds like a virus... But the way it looks like from everyone else... it doesn't exist?

 

[Plaid.exe]

Well, I don't have any up date on what, if anything, it turned out to be.. She said she just bought a new laptop..
I'm pretty sure it was a virus, I just didn't want to say any thing to her about it unless I had something to say..
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to poke around.