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Question:

Is it possible for a virus that infected a PC with Windows OS to show similar erroneous behaviour during a LiveCD session with Ubuntu?

N.B. To clarify my question: Can the liveCD experience be ruined by a BIOS virus (Not the CD itself, I know it is readonly...)

Background

Speaking from a recent experience: A friend has an old XP PC that has suddenly started opening Outlook Express 6 everytime he logs in. Any non-IE browser (Chrome/Mozilla) crashes, and Kaspersky Antivirus also crashes within 2 minutes of starting a scan. I advised him not to use IE8 for browsing.

When I tried booting into it with Ubuntu LiveCD, it kept opening Thunderbird (Default Email client in Ubuntu), and would not let me configure DSL (it cleared all settings after 15-20 seconds of typing in username/password etc). This happened to me for the 1st time with Linux live CDs, usually they're pretty solid.

I am suspecting there is some BIOS virus which may be causing this, but is this a possibility with a Linux LiveCD too?

[Edit] The CPU was sent to a mechanic who found many virii and was unable to clean it without formatting the drive (after taking data backup). Still not sure if a bios virus was there. Given the vulnerability of WinXP post support-end, AND the supremely careless browsing habits of my friend, I suspect there is still a chance of the virus being the root cause. He's getting a new Win7 PC now

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    Possible yes. Likely I have no idea. The BIOS is still booted before the LiveCD
    – FDinoff
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 19:41
  • Its unlikely a BIOS virus. Those are extremely rare. If I were to hazard a guess its likely a hardware issue.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 20:00

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Sounds like a broken keyboard. Is there an email shortcut key? Other keyboard malfunctions would account for the other issues.

That or a novelty random keypress generator? Very unlikely to be a BIOS virus. Too hard to create to waste on stupid stuff like this.

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  • I did suspect a jammed key (Multimedia keyboards can have Email keys I guess), but what was unique: I could type in all the credentials for Network connections in Ubuntu LiveCD alright, then it disappeared after 15-20 seconds. The novelty keypress generator sounds more probable. On opening a DOS window in Safe Mode (WinXP), I could not run any command, but saw random strings being entered one after another...
    – Sambuddha
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 22:18
  • Is the keyboard wireless? Looks like there is some history of strange behavior on wireless keyboards forums.logitech.com/t5/Keyboard-Software/…. Keyboards can fail in very strange ways.
    – ssmy
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 22:23
  • A close catch, but unfortunately no, its a PS3 keyboard :) This friend is actually my landlord, he's a senior. He was using a ball mouse till last week! He did send his CPU to the mechanic (w/o the keyboard) and they found lots of virus on his PC (they could not clean it, the only option left is to format the drive/reinstall windows XP for h/w constraint). I do not know if they at least found a BIOS virus to confirm my suspicion, but not a keyboard issue alone for sure.
    – Sambuddha
    Commented Apr 25, 2014 at 18:18

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