0 file(s) scanned

Avast Mac Security
1

Hi there,

I have been using Avast for years now and I am stuck with a brand-new error on my all-new iMac 2019. I have tried to run both Mac Scans and Deep Scans and all of them keep displaying 0% until they finally display “0 file(s) scanned in [X] hours”. I have ticked all checkboxes in Avast Settings for both Mac & Deep Scan (incl. “Whole Files”, etc.) but it did not change a thing. I have checked System Preferences settings on my iMac and all permissions are properly granted to Avast under Security & Privacy > Privacy > “Full Disk Access” (as well as “Files and Folders”).

Has anyone encountered a similar issue or could share some hints?

Thanks!

2

Hello,

this is the first time this has been reported to us, however this issue has now also been mentioned in https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=231141.0
Please send us support package (https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/Submit-Mac-Security-support-file); also due to the association with the linked issue, if you would be willing, please email ondrej.kolacek@avast.com to schedule a remote access session where I would try to diagnose the issue.

Kind regards,
Ondrej Kolacek

3

Hi Ondrej,

Many thanks for your response. I have just submitted a Support Package from Avast > Help > Avast Technical Support > Generate Support Package.

FYI: I reinstalled macOS Catalina (10.15.2) from scratch 2 hours ago and only installed Avast Security for Mac as I was suspecting some kind of a conflict with another app. It somehow seems to be tied to Catalina. However I did the exact same thing yesterday night (i.e. reinstalling Catalina from scratch and… Avast ran with no issue whatsoever!!! This is extremely weird as I just cannot think of any setting that I would have set differently during the install of macOS Catalina.

Thanks for any assistance you could provide.

Luc

4

Hi,
please check your mail.
Kind regards,
Ondrej Kolacek

5

I’m also getting zero files scanned, on an iMac running Catalina. Did you find a solution to this?

6

Same here. I have the 0 file(s) scanned problem with USB-Devices and Folders I want to scan. If I try to scan single files then it works. Hoping for a quick solution. I think many users have this problem but most of them don’t realize they have these issues.
Deep Scan does work but it’s much quicker than in former times. So I’m not sure if it works properly regarding to the problems explained above.

In my opinion it’s a major issue that USB-devices are not scanned properly at the moment.

7

Hello,

the issue is somewhere in our code that does an analysis of disk configuration. Due to this taking excessive time, the scan fails to even start. For two our users, this has been caused by an external drive being plugged in when scan starts. A workaround is to unplug an external drive before starting the scan.

This is indeed a huge issue, although this does not impact fileshield, so it should not be a security issue regarding viruses on your computer; however not being able to scan is indeed somewhat unfortunate :slight_smile:

Please if this happens for you and you’ve got few minutes, consider helping us by following these directions:

  1. plug in the disk that causes this
  2. run scan
  3. run Activity Monitor app (by eg pressing cmd+space and searching for Activity Monitor)
  4. Go to menu, View-> All processes
  5. find process com.avast.scan_helper in the list, double click it
  6. on the bottom left is a button “sample”, press it and enter your password
  7. use “save” on the top right to save the sample
  8. ideally create 2-3 samples, but even one is better than nothing :slight_smile:
  9. send it to ondrej.kolacek at avast.com
  10. send us support package (https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/Submit-Mac-Security-support-file) and specify the same mail used in 9) so that we can match these.

Hopefully with this information we will be able to verify that we have indeed found the issue and will be able to ship an update ASAP.

Kind regards,
Ondrej Kolacek

8

Follow up: the issue has been confirmed and will be fixed in the next release. The issue does not impact fileshield, which scans files when accessed. As a temporary workaround, you can unplug external drive with time machine backup while scanning. We apologise for the issue.