AVAST not showing notification on detection of malicious sites

system · 2017-02-22T17:29:57.000Z

To add here, Chrome extension of AVAST turns RED second time when we visit malicious site. But no proper notification message or popup is shown.

TheOwner · 2017-02-22T22:15:16.000Z

Don’t worry. Once is detected malware, connection is disconnected by default. And if is disconnected, malware can’t visit your PC. You can change this in web shield options.

system · 2017-02-23T18:12:48.000Z

Yes I know that it is disconnected. But AVAST should show a notification as well every time we visit any malicious site.

DavidR · 2017-02-23T18:43:18.000Z

skanungo2007 post:4:

Yes I know that it is disconnected. But AVAST should show a notification as well every time we visit any malicious site.

An entry would/should be place in the WebShield report file, C:\ProgramData\AVAST Software\Avast\report\WebShield.txt

I would also suggest that you change the default settings for the Web Shield - AvastUI > Components > Web Shield - customise > Actions and set the Primary option to Ask. This will throw up the interactive alert window, so you will get a notification of sorts immediately. Your only other option is Abort Connection, which will close that alert window.

That said when you visit a malicious site (if avast detects it) then it aborts the connection, so you may be left with a blank browser page.

system · 2017-02-24T17:47:19.000Z

I certainly understand your point. But what I am trying to say that AVAST always should display pop up. Now the case is once it has shown popup for one malicious site, it will not show any other popup if you visit that particular site again or any other malicious sites. It blocks the connection though giving users a wrong interpretation that there might be something wrong with proxy or DNS or website is temporarily not available. There is an option ‘show notification when action is taken’ and that said when this option is ticked or checked it show a message every time we visit malicious site and not once.

DavidR post:5:

skanungo2007 post:4:

Yes I know that it is disconnected. But AVAST should show a notification as well every time we visit any malicious site.

An entry would/should be place in the WebShield report file, C:\ProgramData\AVAST Software\Avast\report\WebShield.txt

I would also suggest that you change the default settings for the Web Shield - AvastUI > Components > Web Shield - customise > Actions and set the Primary option to Ask. This will throw up the interactive alert window, so you will get a notification of sorts immediately. Your only other option is Abort Connection, which will close that alert window.

That said when you visit a malicious site (if avast detects it) then it aborts the connection, so you may be left with a blank browser page.

JiříŠembera · 2017-02-24T18:09:52.000Z

Hi skanungo2007,

this is a design decision because there were cases, when tons of alerts were showing up, because a program was trying to access a blocked page over and over again which was a huge annoyance. So there is a timeout for the alert to show up again - but just for the one particular URL. When you access a differend malicious site, the pop-up shows as expected.

Jiri

skanungo2007 post:6:

I certainly understand your point. But what I am trying to say that AVAST always should display pop up. Now the case is once it has shown popup for one malicious site, it will not show any other popup if you visit that particular site again or any other malicious sites. It blocks the connection though giving users a wrong interpretation that there might be something wrong with proxy or DNS or website is temporarily not available. There is an option ‘show notification when action is taken’ and that said when this option is ticked or checked it show a message every time we visit malicious site and not once.

DavidR post:5:

skanungo2007 post:4:

Yes I know that it is disconnected. But AVAST should show a notification as well every time we visit any malicious site.

An entry would/should be place in the WebShield report file, C:\ProgramData\AVAST Software\Avast\report\WebShield.txt

I would also suggest that you change the default settings for the Web Shield - AvastUI > Components > Web Shield - customise > Actions and set the Primary option to Ask. This will throw up the interactive alert window, so you will get a notification of sorts immediately. Your only other option is Abort Connection, which will close that alert window.

That said when you visit a malicious site (if avast detects it) then it aborts the connection, so you may be left with a blank browser page.

Alikhan · 2017-02-24T18:15:35.000Z

I also raised this point with the Avast team but eventually agreed with them. This was mainly to stop spammed popups when malware was calling home every few seconds.

Response from Avast Team:

There is a 10 minute timer for which Avast remembers last 100 blocked URLs. For those URL the toaster does not show up again. It will show up once the 10 minutes pass or if you restart shields. Enabling the popup every time could in some cases lead to an endless sctream of popups that would flood the user. We do not want that. Also the logic when handling the last 100 blocked URLs within the 10 minute interval is different - the connection is immediately blocked instead of scanning its content. This is much more performance friendly. If we would scan the content every time, it could mean a severe performance hit to your system, hogging your CPU and memory.

DavidR · 2017-02-24T18:26:39.000Z

skanungo2007 post:6:

I certainly understand your point. But what I am trying to say that AVAST always should display pop up. Now the case is once it has shown popup for one malicious site, it will not show any other popup if you visit that particular site again or any other malicious sites.

It blocks the connection though giving users a wrong interpretation that there might be something wrong with proxy or DNS or website is temporarily not available. There is an option ‘show notification when action is taken’ and that said when this option is ticked or checked it show a message every time we visit malicious site and not once.

Sorry I couldn’t agree less, if they are going to show a popup (without the user changing the settings), showing that popup just once is totally crazy. If you go to a malicious site you get the popup, go back later or to another malicious site and not give an alert popup would give the user a False Negative. They believe the site/s are clear or the initial popup was an False Positive.

One of the most common popups on malicious sites is the URL:Mal popup and as Jiří Šembera mentioned, these usually come at regular intervals. They can also be an indication that you have an undetected or hidden malware file on your system that is trying to get out to connect to a malicious site.

EDIT: Typo.

Alikhan · 2017-02-24T18:31:25.000Z

DavidR post:9:

If you go to a malicious site you get the popup, go back later or to another malicious site and not give an alert popup would give the user a False Negative.

That’s wrong. If you go to another malicious website, there will be an alert popup. Once you’ve received that alert for that website, you won’t get a pop-up for 10 more mins on the websites you’ve already had the popup for unless you restart shields.

You can test with http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and http://test-url-blocker.avast.com/

Edit: Added more info.

system · 2017-02-24T19:40:01.000Z

Basically that don’t happen. I have tested with different valid malicious site that are in the database of AVAST. Once a notification is shown for the first site, other sites gets blocked automatically without showing any notification. This is what really happens. If you want I can share some valid links (malicious) which are detected by AVAST but notifications are shown only once giving the user completely a false interpretation.

Alikhan post:10:

DavidR post:9:

If you go to a malicious site you get the popup, go back later or to another malicious site and not give an alert popup would give the user a False Negative.

That’s wrong. If you go to another malicious website, there will be an alert popup. Once you’ve received that alert for that website, you won’t get a pop-up for 10 more mins on the websites you’ve already had the popup for unless you restart shields.

You can test with http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and http://test-url-blocker.avast.com/

Edit: Added more info.

system · 2017-02-24T19:43:47.000Z

If the case was really that, then it should be left to the user’s discretion when and how to show alert messages. In fact when I have checked the option ‘show notification window when action is taken’ option, AVAST should show a pop up. Otherwise that can be considered as a bug. Now if too many alerts are generated in rare cases, there should be options like “Don’t show notification for this event” and “restore hidden notification” by which user can enable or disable or better customize the way they want the alert.

Jiří Šembera post:7:

Hi skanungo2007,

this is a design decision because there were cases, when tons of alerts were showing up, because a program was trying to access a blocked page over and over again which was a huge annoyance. So there is a timeout for the alert to show up again - but just for the one particular URL. When you access a differend malicious site, the pop-up shows as expected.

Jiri

skanungo2007 post:6:

I certainly understand your point. But what I am trying to say that AVAST always should display pop up. Now the case is once it has shown popup for one malicious site, it will not show any other popup if you visit that particular site again or any other malicious sites. It blocks the connection though giving users a wrong interpretation that there might be something wrong with proxy or DNS or website is temporarily not available. There is an option ‘show notification when action is taken’ and that said when this option is ticked or checked it show a message every time we visit malicious site and not once.

DavidR post:5:

skanungo2007 post:4:

Yes I know that it is disconnected. But AVAST should show a notification as well every time we visit any malicious site.

An entry would/should be place in the WebShield report file, C:\ProgramData\AVAST Software\Avast\report\WebShield.txt

I would also suggest that you change the default settings for the Web Shield - AvastUI > Components > Web Shield - customise > Actions and set the Primary option to Ask. This will throw up the interactive alert window, so you will get a notification of sorts immediately. Your only other option is Abort Connection, which will close that alert window.

That said when you visit a malicious site (if avast detects it) then it aborts the connection, so you may be left with a blank browser page.

system · 2017-02-24T19:47:30.000Z

I can share some valid malicious sites that are in the database of AVAST which I used for the purpose of testing to figure out the issue, but unfortunately AVAST shows blocked notification only for the first site that you visit. For others it is simply blocked. I don’t know the timeout period as others mentioned. But what I did was to restart and check with some other URL and the same applies for that also.

Alikhan post:10:

DavidR post:9:

If you go to a malicious site you get the popup, go back later or to another malicious site and not give an alert popup would give the user a False Negative.

That’s wrong. If you go to another malicious website, there will be an alert popup. Once you’ve received that alert for that website, you won’t get a pop-up for 10 more mins on the websites you’ve already had the popup for unless you restart shields.

You can test with http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and http://test-url-blocker.avast.com/

Edit: Added more info.

Alikhan · 2017-02-24T20:17:17.000Z

You can test with http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and http://test-url-blocker.avast.com/.

Once you turn off shields and start them again, you’ll get pop up again.

Regarding your malware samples, don’t post them here. However, are you sure they’re not from the same domain? A prime example would be AMTSO. Since they’re coming from same domain after detection of of the first file, you wouldn’t get the popups… same for EICAR files.

midnight · 2017-02-24T22:16:48.000Z

@Alikhan,

I clicked on http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and I got this pop-up.

Alikhan · 2017-02-24T22:20:54.000Z

-midnight post:15:

@Alikhan,

I clicked on http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and I got this pop-up.

Hi,

That’s fine and is normal behaviour. It’s just a test link to show Web Shield is working.

midnight · 2017-02-24T22:23:49.000Z

Thank you. I was afraid I might have a virus.

DavidR · 2017-02-24T22:25:08.000Z

-midnight post:15:

@Alikhan,

I clicked on http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and I got this pop-up.

That is what a test page for the web shield is all about - it tested the web shield - and you got the web shield alert.

It is like the Eicar test files, but this is for the web shield, to show what an alert would be like and that it is working.

TheOwner · 2017-02-24T22:32:08.000Z

“URL:Mal” means this url is somewhere blacklisted and is blocked before my browser connect this site? Or it means on this site was found malware which was blocked? So no malware come to my PC? Is important block malware before is executed, not after.

DavidR · 2017-02-24T23:22:50.000Z

TheOwner post:19:

“URL:Mal” means this url is somewhere blacklisted and is blocked before my browser connect this site? Or it means on this site was found malware which was blocked? So no malware come to my PC? Is important block malware before is executed, not after.

I think that we are all aware what URL:Mal is all about and was also mentioned in Reply #8 above.

system · 2017-02-25T05:06:08.000Z

Yes this is not a place to share malicious links.

But the links are from different domain. For me AVAST detects eicar and shows warning every time I try to download eicar test file from www.eicar.org.

Alikhan post:14:

You can test with http://web-shield-test.avast.com/ and http://test-url-blocker.avast.com/.

Once you turn off shields and start them again, you’ll get pop up again.

Regarding your malware samples, don’t post them here. However, are you sure they’re not from the same domain? A prime example would be AMTSO. Since they’re coming from same domain after detection of of the first file, you wouldn’t get the popups… same for EICAR files.

Announcements