A Microsoft Windows XP workstation was presented with the STOP: (parameter, parameter, parameter, parameter) SESSION3_INITIALIZATION_FAILED blue screen message on boot. Microsoft does address this STOP message, however, for earlier versions of Windows. Microsoft suggests that the problem might be with a device driver. With that in mind, and knowing that no additional hardware had been added in recent memory, the %windows%\system32\drivers becomes the focal point of this investigation.

Using a bootable repair CD, we were able to see the contents of the %windows%\system32\drivers and %windows%\system32 and were presented with many new files created within the last few days, even what appeared to be new device drivers. Though many of the files appeared to have some random names, others were a bit more difficult to determine if these were pests or not by their names, ie. TDSS????.sys found in the drivers folder (this file is also identified in this forum), we knew that no new hardware was added so these files had to go. After removing these files to a temporary folder and running a system antivirus scan, it turned out to be a Trojan or rootkit. In fact, this computer had several Trojans on it. Once the scan was completed and the pests removed, the system booted normally and as expected.

When it comes to the STOP: 0x0000006F (parameter, parameter, parameter, parameter) SESSION3_INITIALIZATION_FAILED error on a Microsoft Windows XP workstation, it is likely to be a “device driver” and more likely to be a malicious “device driver”. Using a bootable repair CD is the easiest and most effective way to clean this pest from your system. Using your favorite search engine, will result in many different repair CDs, choose one that at least contains a file explorer to perform manual file deletions and an antivirus to scan and clean probable virus, Trojan, and rootkits. This process took nearly an hour and half to clean completely. The majority of this time was the file by file system scan by an antivirus.