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I know that Ubuntu is immune to virus so there is no question of it getting infected while browsing the net.however I frequently transfer files from my pendrive (which I get from other virus infested computers) to my own laptop and save it on the data drive which is shared by both windows and Ubuntu.

I would like to know if there is a chance for Windows viruses which might get saved and then infect it whenever I switch to windows later on.its ironic that I scan my pendrive using avast on Windows and then save all my files to my hard drive to keep my laptop free from virus even though I have Ubuntu.

Can anyone suggest an alternative?

Ringtail
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fr33c0untry
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2 Answers2

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Viruses affect systems where that file is executed on.

You can not execute an .exe on a normal Ubuntu so there you will not have an issue. Viruses for Linux are not that mature to affect us. The smaller marketshare might have something to do with it. Or that the average Linux user is more aware of what he/she is doing. Might be all of those. But nevertheless a Linux virus like they appear in Windows has yet to be found.

2 problem area's:

  1. You can execute it with wine. Wine has restrictions but this can(/will) affect your wine 'partition' and programs used with wine and everything you can access from within wine as long as the Linux permissions let you. So -never- use sudo or go to root when using wine (this is more of a general rule and not related to Viruses).

  2. If you use Ubuntu to download a file with a virus and then move the file to a Windows system this virus will be activated on executing that file and it will affect your Windows system.

So the answer to your question is: yes, if you move those files to a Windows system it will be able to harm your Windows system. But for those last 2 cases you can use a virus scanner on Ubuntu to check files before you move them to Windows. Catching the bug before it reaches the OS it is meant to mess with is the smarter options (besides not using Windows ;) )

Some interesting topics:

Community
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Rinzwind
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No, the reason Ubuntu is immune to Windows viruses is because they cannot execute, they're written for windows and windows libraries. The only way to execute a Windows Viruses in Ubuntu or any Linux distro is from Wine, if you do that I will only be able to affect your virtual C drive that wine creates (not your actual C drive with windows)

TL:DR No.

Space Bear
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