Hello guys,
After I installed avast mohile and anti theft, I just found one problem. Every time I try to set up my already existing account (from anti theft or from anti virus) it returns an error message : authentication_failed.
I already uninstalled and installed again for no avail. This problem is now praising for more than 24hrs. Any ideas to solve this problem? The phone is a galaxy S. Android 2.3.3
Thanks for your time.
You’re certainly not the only one experiencing this problem of late; see: http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=135821.0
Hello,
Thanks for your reply.
I just unistalled the App and re installed. I didnt clear all the phone.
Befor uninstall it was working fine…
I dont have any idea about what happened 
Thanks!
Hello guys,
Anyone has successfully resolved this issue?
Thnaks for your time!
(The following is a direct copy & paste of my post located here)
To update with the latest response I’ve gotten from avast! Support on this matter:
The problem isn't on your, or our side. It's Google Cloud to Device Messaging - a service provided by google that we use to communicate with the installation. Sometimes the command messages don't make it to the device and the command just times out. Or the command message arrives at the device, the command is executed - but the return message (confirming the reception) doesn't arrive at the server. It's actually a google problem - we can hardly improve this.
I have the same problem.
I am a premium user (pay regularly every month) and I also can’t set anti theft to work anymore on my wife’s phone.
I can set it up on my phone any time (s4,stock android 4.3). My account gets recognized and everything works fine. But when I try it on my wife’s galaxy i9000B (android stock 2.3.3) , I get the AUTHENTICATION_FAILED when trying to link it to her account (same message if I try to link it to my account). I’ve been trying it for a month.
I doesn’t seem be to a Google problem, since I can do it on my phone. Also, it is very odd that the message pops up almost instantly after clicking… It is like there wasn’t even any attempt to communicate.
I must say that we had anti theft working on her previous phone (galaxy s3 - got lost). This new one uses the same number as the old one, but I don’t think that’s the problem. I have upgraded my phone several times, keeping my SIM number, and I have always reinstalled avast without any issue.
Well, authentication_failed is message from Google Cloud messaging (GCM), which is Google service and part of google service framework and this is again a part of android OS. This message could be seen on 2.3.X devices and 3.X devices mainly. We know about this problem and working on the solution, but we can not be responsible for changing of google services by any way. What happen: on older android versions have been installed two crucial services C2DM and Android Market; these two been dispatching all google communication (means between device and google services, apps, accounts, etc.), but in June 2012 Google stopped supporting this framework and oriented on GCM and new Play - but they are targeted for 4+ android OS. Now the older devices with C2DM installed has been forced to use GCM and Play, but some applications recognizes f.e. only device version and OS version and do not parse the version of GCM/C2DM, so it easily can happen that the communication between device and google service can be broken somehow. Nobody knows when and how Google is supporting or not the “old style” comlink, so yes, the users can experience this type of error. As mentioned, we are working on it, but it is not quite avast mistake :-/ Thank you for patience!
Guys, i like many others have been trying to connect my avast account to my smartphone and the error messages are keep getting in the way. When will you guess fix this? and when will google show some love for the older mobile os system?
hello,
i have samsung galaxy s i9000 with android 2.3.6 rooted stock rom.
i solved the problem by removing google play related updates.
go to:
settings → apps → app manager → “downloaded”
tap these:
-google play services
-hangouts
-google search
-any google related app (execpt google play)
then, remove the updates OR remove the app’s itself.
i hope it will work for you.
This is temporary solution, in next update session Play will update the Google framework again
Didn’t work for me, not even temporarily
(Galaxy Tab, Android 2.1)
I am afraid, that Google does not support GCM on 2.1 devices…what happen if you try to update all Google services (Play, Framework…)?