aVast! 4 Unable to scan "Cannot Not Open File...."

system · 2007-07-20T18:34:48.000Z

I hope the subject line was somewhat explanatory but its getting to the point there are 161 of these such folders, my PC has ‘shut’ the ability for aVast! to scan.
How do I allow these files (all of them) to be able to scanned by AVast?

???

DavidR · 2007-07-20T19:14:36.000Z

The ‘File can’t be scanned,’ at the end of an on-demand scan may have many legitimate reasons and you need to expand the column width to see the full text. That is why there are … at the end of the “Cannot Not Open File…” as there is more text.

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.

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

Lisandro · 2007-07-20T20:30:42.000Z

Other good way to follow is a boot time scanning.
See also: http://www.digitalred.com/avast-boot-time.php

If infected files are found, it’s safer to send them to Chest instead of deleting them.
This way you can further analysis them.

Access denied means, generally, that the file is in use by another process (program) and cannot be repaired/cleaned/moved/handled by avast! The report file is created automatically in \Data\Report\aswBoot.txt

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