Under W2k-SP4, Avast prevents me from accessing the Web. This situation popped up on July 11th, probably after an update of the virus data base. If I deactivate the Web Shield, things are ok.
This situation already occurred between early November and December 20th (cf. http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=24658.0;topicseen).
This does not appear to be the case with XP.
I’m using 4.7.1001 Home Edition
Do you have any firewall installed?
Into the firewall settings, the following programs should be allowed to connect:
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashWebSv.exe (avast! Web Scanner)
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashMaiSv.exe (avast! e-Mail Scanner Service)
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\Setup\avast.setup (avast! Update executable). This is a temporary file that just appears when an update (check) is about to launch, and disappears again afterwards.
Don’t need rights to connect:
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashServ.exe (avast! antivirus service)
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\aswUpdSv.exe (avast! Update Service)
Sygate could be messing the connection… delete the avast entries into Sygate settings, browse and update to ‘add’ them again.
The problem appears to lie with Avast. Even when I shut down Sygate, the problem is still there.
For my mail, it’s even worse. I stop Avast completely in order to get it. I even shut down MailWasher. I’ll have to refine this aspect and shut down the services one after the other since another shield besides Web Shield is blocking the mail.
I have mailwasher ignored by the internet mail scanner as I feel the risk is negligible, see below. Though I don’t believe this will have any effect on your problem and apart from your original topic I haven’t seen this in the forums.
MailWasher doesn’t download the complete email to do its analysis, it only downloads the headers, a small part of the body, it doesn’t download images or attachments and it views what is downloaded in text only. Based on this I personally don’t feel that any negligible risk worth scanning duplication, but the choice is yours.
By editing the avast4.ini file, [MailScanner] section using a text editor like notepad. It is best to save a copy of avast4.ini to another location in case of any problem, you can then copy the original back.
[MailScanner]
IgnoreProcess=MailWasher.exe add this line if you don’t already have an IgnoreProcess line.
The problem disappeared this morning after an Avast update.
Please note that I have been using Avast and Sygate side-by-side for the past 5 years approximately, both under w2k and xp. No problem at all popped up except for the two instances mentioned in this thread.
Thanks to all for your suggestions.
Your welcome, though I’m baffled how a VPS update could have any effect as that shouldn’t change anything in the web shield provider.
I would still suggest you do as suggested with mailwasher being ignored.