Can empty card be infected?

[ehmen]

Hi, is it possible for an empty SD card to be infected in any way?

[Eddy]

Is there anything in a empty bucket ?

[ehmen]

Is there anything in a empty bucket ?

Computers and devices differ in that they can contain hidden things, examples of which this great website is replete with, not so with a bucket.

[Eddy]

No they do not.
empty = empty
empty means there is nothing.

If something is hidden it means there is something.

[ehmen]

No they do not.
empty = empty
empty means there is nothing.

If something is hidden it means there is something.

Exactly, so if a card looks empty in that there's no files on it and "Properties" says it's empty, could there still be some kind of virus/infection/malware/whatever on it, which would make in reality not empty, though it seems that it is?

[Pondus]

Install MCShield   www.mcshield.net    when done, plug in the card and let mcshield scan it ... it will unhide hidden files and remove any infection

[ehmen]

There aren't actually any files (since hidden ones are visible, and there aren't any), I'm just wondering if there can be any infection without actual files.
Can MCShield detect that as well?

Thank you for your response.

[Pondus]

MCShields specialty is malware that use removable drives to spread. That is what it was made for
Search virus and worms forum section and see all the topics where Essexboy have saved the day using MCShield

He will be online tomorrow if you want his assistance

[ehmen]

Thank you.

[Michael (alan1998)]

There aren't actually any files (since hidden ones are visible, and there aren't any), I'm just wondering if there can be any infection without actual files.
Can MCShield detect that as well?

Thank you for your response.

There is 1 piece of malware that is fileless.

https://www.mysonicwall.com/sonicalert/searchresults.aspx?ev=article&id=761

Runs completely from the Windows Registry

[DavidR]

There aren't actually any files (since hidden ones are visible, and there aren't any), I'm just wondering if there can be any infection without actual files.
Can MCShield detect that as well?

Thank you for your response.

There is 1 piece of malware that is fileless.

https://www.mysonicwall.com/sonicalert/searchresults.aspx?ev=article&id=761

Runs completely from the Windows Registry

Whilst that may be correct, I don't see how it can be equated/related to an empty SD Card as that isn't the registry.

[Chim]

Okay, so say that I buy a Flash Drive and as soon as I take it out of the pack and plug it into my computer, I then format it so as to get rid of any pre-installed whatever might have come with it.  NOW ... just freshly formatted, won't it STILL have some sort of files in there for the Flash Drive to work?  Isn't that how it gets explained as to why you never get the actual GigaBytes available that the Flash Drive is supposed to have?

I'm just wondering, trying to confirm one way or the other.  I'm not trying to claim anything.

[DavidR]

The formatting of any drive results in the loss of some of the available space. Plus manufactures talk in a MegaByte (MB) as 1000 bytes and not its actual size 1024 bytes. When viewed in explorer, its size is shown correctly and less than the manufactures stated size.

[Chim]

So bottom line ... in the process of formatting, won't there be some files somewhere in there regardless of how small they might be?

[DavidR]

Well like a hard drive, presumably there would be a FAT table (file allocation table) to record where files are on the disk so they can be found and used. But that is a system style beast and not a file as such in the conventional sense.

Even after a format (Quick Format) of certain media data remains, but the space it took up is marked as available for use and there is no longer a record of that file in the FAT. There is software that can search for and recover data of a so called formatted disk.

Now that you question has you paranoid - the only true way to get rid of all of the data it to - either destroy the disk of run some super strength erasure software. It isn't actually erasing but doing multiple passes of writing random data over where the original data was. And that doesn't remove everything it just makes it much harder to recover it because of all of the random over writing it.

I bet you're glad you asked.

If you really want a scare try Google as the above is just my basic description/understanding.