advice required please

[system]

I Have the current version of Avast version 5.
Having scanned my computer I get the message “some files could not be scanned”
There is a long list of these files and I get the same message when clicking on any of them “Archive is password protected”
The main Avast page shows that 0 viruses have been found.
Can some one clarify what all this is about ? Do I need to be worried about any of this ?
Thanks

[system]

Hi duncan49, welcome to the forum

I’ll borrow a post from DavidR here, I can’t say it better

@DavidR post:2

Files that can’t be scanned are just that, not an indication they are suspicious/infected, just unable to be scanned.

Many programs (usually security based ones) password protect their files for legitimate reasons such as AdAware and Spybot Search & Destroy, there are others (and avast doesn’t know the password or have any way of using it even if it did know it).

When you run scans with the above programs and you delete harmful entries that they detect, a copy is kept (in quarantine/restore/backup) in case you need to reverse what you did. These are usually password protected, you should do some housekeeping and delete old backup/recovery/quarantine entries (older than two weeks or so), this will reduce the numbers of files that can’t be scanned.

By examining 1) the reason given by avast! for not being able to scan the files, 2) the location of the files, you can get an idea of what program they relate to. You may need to expand the column headings to see all the text.

If you can give some examples of those file names, the locations and reason given why it can’t be scanned might help us further ?
…

So do you have the locations of the files?
You should be able to get the location from the scan log section under scan computer.

Bear in mind also, that to scan the archives, avast! will have to have the password, which it doesn’t so it can’t scan them…

-Scott-

[system]

The files seem to be in a number of places… A couple refer to Microsoft security… a number are in my documents folder (which seems odd) I will clear that folder out and do a rescan meanwhile thanks for your quick response to my post.