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cannot delete folder!

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13 replies

by reference

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We recently found evidence of an intruder on our system(win2000-sp3), through countless measures, I think we have effectivley shut him down, and locked him out, however;
I have one problem I can't figure out. There is a folder in my iissamples directory that I cannot delete. if I try to delete iissamples, I get an error:cannot remove folder. Directory name is invalid.
If I try to delete the first folder under iissamples, I get error:cannot delete. cannot find the specified file.
each folder underneath alternates these two errors. the folder names are iissample=>com1=>GOD=>com4=>GOD=>com2....
I can't seem to browse much further that com2 folder.
Is this normal...NO
Is this a redirection of some sort?
Is the folder chain too long for Windows to deal with?
Any help is greatly appreciated, Thanks in advance.

13 replies

by timwalsh

If these folders were created by the intruder, there may be some sort of wierd permissions set on them. Try taking ownership of them (as administrator), resetting permissions, and then re-attempting to delete them.

by reference

It shows administrator as the owner, however; even when I tried to change/re-establish the owner, I got the same error: The system cannot find the file specified.

by wburrows

Try rebooting into Safe Mode with a command prompt. If some process is locking/hiding the directory chances are booting up in this manner will let you delete it.

by j.a.lawrence

The problem is that COM2 is a reserved name in Win32.

According to this article, Q320081 in MS KB, try the following:

del {full path to file}\filename, use the 8.3 naming convention if its long

by reference

I got ahold of rm.exe utility from NT 4.0 Resource Kit, and was able to then remove the folders! Thanks for the help!!

by thytrickster

I hate to say it, but I have been in your exact situation. I was the Network Admin for my company and the owner decided he wanted a "Public" ftp.... He said users didn't like 'names' and 'passwords'. No matted how I warned... Oh well, he's the one paying me. Low and behold, within 3 days I had a directory that I could not remove, take ownership, rename, delete. Although I did fix the problem and get rid of the directory... the one and only way... yes, I moved all my other data, and waxed the partition. Recreated the partition moved everything back. Then set my security back up on the FTP. Never had a problem since.

I know you won't like my answer... :)

by reference

We may still end up doing this! I just don't feel confident that everything is secure! Thanks

by reference

I got ahold of rm.exe utility from NT 4.0 Resource Kit, and was able to then remove the folders! Thanks for the help!!

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