I have a friend who is not very computer literate, and he has
developed a problem with his system. Thus he has asked for my help.

He is using Windows ME, and there is a hidden directory named
C:\_RESTORE which contains several sub-directories. In one of these
subdirectories, there are a number of .CAB files which cause his
anti-virus software to fail a scan. He uses Command A-V and his
definitions are up-to-date.

One of the .CAB files gets a diagnostic during and anti-virus scan
that there is probably a corrupt .EXE file there. Another gets the
diagnostic that it is probably a trojan (backdoor) program, and a
third gets the corrupt .EXE again. Soon after that the scan
terminates, incomplete.

I have tried everything that immediately came to mind and hand, but I
am unable to delete the _RESTORE directory, any of its
sub-directories, or any of the individual files within the
directories. I have also installed Spyware Blaster, Spybot, and
Hijack This on his PC to get rid of a lot of spyware that was slowing
him down.

My next attempt at helping him (tomorrow) will involve re-starting his
PC in MS-DOS mode and using the "attrib -h -r" command on anything
that is in the _RESTORE directory, and see if that helps.

Can anyone here perhaps identify what I am looking at? Any possible
solutions? TIA.

QM