Weird language on Win XP control panel

G'day all,

Just wanted to ask, I am currently running Win XP service pack 2. Just recently I started my computer and went to control panel. I noticed that the last 3 icons in the control panel window were written in a weird language. I didn't really pay much attention to it until today when I went to System Properties and noticed that some of the tabs in there were also written in this weird language (it looks like arabic but I really wouldn't know).

So I thought it someone messed around with the regional language but nothing seems out of the ordinary.

Do i just have a virus\adware\malware?

Just curious. Does the weird language look something like this:

יש לי בעיה עם המחשב שלי

Also, somewhere under Region and Language settings, there is an option to select a display language for non-Unicode programs. Is that set to anything? If so, what?

Wierd language looks similar to that. On the Regional and Language settings it is set for English (US) for non-Unicode programs. Changed it to English (Australia) but there was no change still same problem.

Hmmmm,

Certainly not Arabic.............................. I would say Hebrew.:halo:

Strange though, normally if you change languages or character sets you change the lot rather than just a few?

Which icons/tabs are they?

Yip that is Hebrew ... do you have any malware symptoms ?

Just another point of view.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Cider

Yip that is Hebrew ... do you have any malware symptoms ?

Just another point of view.

---

I will support Cider's Malware suspicion.. Had similar results with a recent AnitVirusXP infection..(clients bug not mine).. I just threw the Toolbox at it so I can't say exactly which malware caused it..
Here is a trick.. Bring up task manager.. go to processes and select "Show All users"...do you also have a undecipherable User name appearing?

Well when i was cleaning computers registry with this Antivirus XP rubbish there were some entries with hebrew + ascII code.

Im going with malware on this one.

Run a scan with malwarebytes antimalware and spybot.

Malware bytes generaltes a log which you can post here. I dont know if spybot does also generate a logfile as I havent played with the settings.

This is a strange one?

As a rule, malware in today's age tries to hide itself, so altering obvious things like icons and filenames isn't a good idea.

Hebrew is a rather unusual choice of language is it not? I would love to know if the files were called the same thing in Hebrew or does it say something totally different?

Some software updates can have strange effects. I updated my wife's Ad-Aware to 2008 and found that the language had defaulted to Portuguese (not a problem:D) but when I looked at the settings it said that the language was German! When I changed it to English and restarted everything was back to normal:confused:

This is a rather interesting one.

Tis' a mystery. Because of the language settings on my computer, one of my icons (one on the Control Panel for the settings on my Nvidia graphics card) shows up in Hebrew. But the OP says his settings are set to English.

What version and SP of Windows are we talking about here?

I have enabled Hebrew as a language in Win2000 SP4 (fully patched to August 2008) and rebooted, but I cannot seem to replicate the issue. I have the NVIDIA Media Centre software on this box as well.

Incidentally, is the Hebrew right to left or left to right?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by nihil

What version and SP of Windows are we talking about here?

I have enabled Hebrew as a language in Win2000 SP4 (fully patched to August 2008) and rebooted, but I cannot seem to replicate the issue. I have the NVIDIA Media Centre software on this box as well.

Incidentally, is the Hebrew right to left or left to right?

---

I really don't know why there is a debate on this one..

The Question Was.. Could I have Malware?..

A couple of us mentioned that we have seen similar and therefore the issue COULD be.. Malware... Not is... just enough suspicion to look further

So we leave the ball in the OP's court.. who seems to have not bothered replying.. either because the OP's PC is being cleaned.. or has got help else where..OR has been to durn busy to look into the problem and reply

Hi Nihil,
If you were referring to my post, I'm using Vista SP1 right now. But it was the same with Windows XP SP2. I think (But I'm not sure) the reason it's happening with my computer is because I have non-Unicode programs set to display in Hebrew.

If the OP is reading his language settings right, we can probably eliminate that as a cause.

The top line of the icon caption is right to left, the bottom line is left to right.

Quote:

---

I really don't know why there is a debate on this one..

---

Because it is sufficiently exotic to warrant discussion of possibilities other than malware? Whilst the OP's original thinking was that he might have malware, I think that it adds value to discuss other explanations, particularly as he hasn't responded?

preacherman481

Yes, it was your post I was referring to. :)

Quote:

---

The top line of the icon caption is right to left, the bottom line is left to right.

---

Well, right to left is correct for Hebrew, but this sounds like Boustrophedon to me? ("as the ox ploughs")..................... far too subtle for a malware writer I would have thought? :cool:

Sorry fellas,

Sorry I haven't been able to reply as frequently as I would like to. Two reasons work and I'm currently using a mates computer which means I'm limited to the time I am online. I decided to take my computer offline at the moment.

It hasn't affected all icons and tabs. Like I said before when you go to control panel on win xp, most icons are in english except for the windows firewall icon which comes up like below:

جدار حماية Windows

There's two other icons that is effected which comes up like this:

معالج إعداد شبكة الاتصال

I have included a zip file of a screen shot of my computer. I think I'd done it right.

I currently have SP2 installed.

Thanks for the help and apologies again for not being able to respond quickly to your queries.

Something I forgot to mention as well. I think it is Hebrew because as I moved the cursor towards the end of the language it moved the opposite way, which means it is reading right to left which as you guys suggested is Hebrew.

When I try to open, for example, the windows firewall icon everything comes up normal but again everything is in hebrew.

Another extra note as well. I'm not sure if it's important. I have Trend Micro Internet Security and Super Antispyware installed on the computer and there was no malicious software detected.

Hope it helps

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cardd22

Another extra note as well. I'm not sure if it's important. I have Trend Micro Internet Security and Super Antispyware installed on the computer and there was no malicious software detected.

Hope it helps

---

...
On what Nihil was looking at.. it could have been a bad update? check through your system settings..
Also
I do consider any virus scan done in normal mode as inconclusive..

another thought.. what programs have you recently installed? (thought that one may have had a language issue and changed some registry settings ..)

If you run Combofix.. one of items listed in it's report is a list of recently installed software..

I would recommend D/l Combofix and giving it a run - IN SAFE MODE - and post the report ... it may fix nothing.. but it may tell you/us what you installed that may have caused this..
So D/L, run, post the report.. find the d/l here http://download.bleepingcomputer.com/sUBs/ComboFix.exe

Ok, that's not Hebrew. Don't know what it is though.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm,

That is Arabic IMO. Strange thing is that there are little splatters above and below the script?

Now, I hope that preacherman will keep me on the "straight and narrow" with this:lildevil:

The little splats would be the vowels?............. that suggests Koranic Arabic to me, rather than the commonplace variety?

:confused:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by nihil

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm,

That is Arabic IMO. Strange thing is that there are little splatters above and below the script?

Now, I hope that preacherman will keep me on the "straight and narrow" with this:lildevil:

The little splats would be the vowels?............. that suggests Koranic Arabic to me, rather than the commonplace variety?

:confused:

---

It is rather interesting..

Had another AntiVirusXP job today.. Guess which three Icons had a change of Font (looked Chinese??)???
Must be the region that the bug is being picked up.. my thought is the AVXP Server must be having issues with regions.. or it could just be the server's region.. Oldmate must have picked a neo-jihad server, where as my clients have been hitting the Num Cha servers..

Ok,
It seems to be Arabic. I know very little about Arabic, but I ran the words through an on line dictionary.

جدار حماية Windows
(This reads literally Windows Protection Wall, Defense Wall, or something of the sort.)

I didn't bother looking up the other words. I assume they are just translations of the icon's captions from English.

I assume Arabic is like Hebrew having the vowels underneath, but that's my assumption.

Not sure there preacherman, I thought that traditional (Koranic) Arabic had vowels above and below.

Arabic is the same as Hebrew in that it is a right to left language. After all they are both Semitic languages are they not?

This one attracted me because it is different from the run of the mill garbage I normally get to clean out. :)

Undies~ makes an interesting point:

Quote:

---

Had another AntiVirusXP job today.. Guess which three Icons had a change of Font (looked Chinese??)???
Must be the region that the bug is being picked up.. my thought is the AVXP Server must be having issues with regions.. or it could just be the server's region..

---

It certainly looks like this AntiVirusXP or 2008 scareware, which got me thinking that it might even be deliberate?

The general idea of scareware is to frighten the victim into buying useless software. Perhaps changing a few icons is intended to scare people some more as they can actually see the apparent infection.

Preacherman,

The first icon is the Windows firewall, so the literal translation seems reasonable?

Quote:

---

Arabic is the same as Hebrew in that it is a right to left language. After all they are both Semitic languages are they not?

---

Yes, I'm confident enough to say both are right to left, and they are members of the same language family. Also, in normal use, the vowels are not written at all.

Quote:

---

The first icon is the Windows firewall, so the literal translation seems reasonable?

---

Yes, I think so.

The OP seems to have company with this problem. This post in another forum seems to describe the same type (if not identical) problem. It dates back to December 2006.

http://www.anetforums.com/posts.aspx?ThreadIndex=62643

Thanks for all the suggestions and posts fellas. Will try them on the weekend see if it makes any difference. Worse comes to worse I've backed up all my important files, I'll just re-format and re-install.