Did I do this?

[cynatnite]

Thursday night at class one of the girls behind me asked to borrow a flash drive. I gave her mine and while she had it in her laptop there was some kind of problem. I don't know what it was. Another girl next to her helpd her out. I never gave it much thought.

This morning at class, I got out my flash drive, plugged it in and got nothing. The computer would not recognize it. After several attempts, I went to an instructor and he couldn't fix it either.

So, I got my extra flash drive and used it. After a completing a couple of assignments, the computer wouldn't recognize the printer. I couldn't figure out the problem. Then the previous instructor came into the class. In his class all the computers automatically shut down and rebooted. Students lost some of their work. He couldn't print or anything off one of the other computers.

Then I discovered that the library upstairs had similar problems. Classes pretty much ended.

Could my flash drive have caught a virus and infected the computer network?

[canetoad]

1. Can't say with certainty that you did

but it is likely. Or rather, the girl into whose computer your drive was plugged, was the person responsible for the spread of the virus.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/usb-flash-virus-secure,6564.html

[Duer 157099]

2. I think that the time is rapidly approaching where

we'll be thinking about flash drives the same way we think about unprotected sex.

Condoms for flash drives anyone?

[DainBramaged]

3. Flash drives are banned in the Pentagon for this very reason

It is best to buy a U3 secure flash drive with built in anti-virus protection such as a 2/4/8 GB SanDisk Cruzer micro, has McAfee installed and it will protect you from picking up any nasties from other computers/flash drives.