Member Avatar for gikonyo

when i was saving my word document, it sudenly changed to some languge i cannot understand i guess it is chinese language. I suspect it could be virus attack. please help on how to recover my document back to english.

  • 3 Contributors
  • 4 Replies
  • 353 Views
  • 1 Week Discussion Span
  • Latest Post Latest Post by aVar++

Dani AI

Generated

— a sudden switch from readable English to Chinese‑style or nonsense glyphs is most often a display/encoding or font substitution issue, or document corruption — not necessarily a virus. Missing or corrupted fonts, Word substituting a different font, or damaged document XML/templates commonly produce unreadable characters; Word also lists “unreadable characters” as a symptom when a file is damaged. (support.microsoft.com)

Quick, safe checks (make a copy of the file first; never work on the only copy):

  • Inspect the font actually applied: select problematic text and read the Font box on the Home ribbon. If the font name looks unfamiliar or the font is missing, try opening the file on another machine (to see whether the glyphs follow the file or the system). Word exposes a Font Substitution dialog (File → Options → Advanced → Font Substitution) that shows missing/substituted fonts. Starting Word with default settings (/a) disables add‑ins and templates and can rule out template/add‑in causes. (support.microsoft.com)

If the file is damaged or the display checks don’t help:

  • Use Word’s built‑in recovery: File → Open → select the file → click the small arrow next to Open → “Open and Repair.” If that fails, try “Recover Text from Any File” from the Files of type menu to extract plain text (formatting and objects will be lost, but text can often be recovered). Also try inserting the file into a new blank document (Insert → Text from File) or opening it with a different engine (LibreOffice/Google Docs). For locally saved files, check AutoRecover, .wbk backups and Previous Versions/OneDrive version history for older copies. (learn.microsoft.com)

Security and last resorts:

  • If macros or other odd behavior are suspected, run up‑to‑date antivirus scans and consider an offline boot scan (Microsoft Defender Offline) or Microsoft Safety Scanner for an on‑demand check. If none of the above recovers readable text, extracting the .docx as a .zip and opening word/document.xml (or using a specialist recovery tool/professional service) are practical next steps. Back up everything before attempting aggressive repairs. (support.microsoft.com)

Relevant Microsoft references: How to troubleshoot damaged Word documents, Font Substitution in Word, and methods to recover unsaved/previous versions are linked in the official guides above.

Recommended Answers

All 4 Replies

Member Avatar for BigPaw

You could start by highlighting just one sentence and then changing the font to an English language frnt such as Arial. If that works, then do the same for the rest of the document.

Edited by BigPaw
Member Avatar for aVar++

Can you just give us one line of the document, so we can see what kind of language it is?

Member Avatar for gikonyo

this an extract of the document:
ᘆ虨琑 ᘆ졝 ᘆ䡨杓 ᘆ表� ᘆ繨᝗ ᘆ쑨⤂ ᘆꡨ ᘆ驨ܛ ᘆ難པ ᘆ坨籽 ᘆ潨偂 ᘆ艨佄 ᘆ왨꼮 ᘆ杨ᐁ ᘆ鬜 ᘆ剨� ᘆॖ ᘆὨ⍊ ᘆ靨詎 ᘆ≨蹨 ᘆ⁨Ꝣ ᘆ睨푤 ᘆ蝨꠪ ᘆ遨猘 ᘆ텨 ᘆ䑨豾 ᘆ콨꼭 ᘆ╨謪 ᘆ湨伾

Member Avatar for aVar++

Ok, it might be something todo with a macro virus: eitherwise it might be worth asking microsoft, you could either email them or tweet them as they have a support account on twitter.

Be a part of the DaniWeb community

We're a friendly, industry-focused community of developers, IT pros, digital marketers, and technology enthusiasts meeting, networking, learning, and sharing knowledge.