service created with no supporting file: vboxaswdrv

Running Avast Free beta 4 on Win10x64:

Was reviewing my event log and I noticed that Avast apparently had created a Service entry for “VBoxAswDrv”, and the error was that the specififed file was not found.

The service file it wanted to start was supposed to be located in \Program Files\Avast Software\Avast\NG.

To resolve the issue I deleted the service entry from Windows since I don’t even have an “NG” folder, let alone that particular service file.

/jim

I’ve seen this also - suspect something in the code hasn’t been cleaned up properly.

Could anyone from Avast reply what to do with this issue, please?

I have also the driver VBoxAswDrv with the missing image (C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\ng\vbox\VBoxAswDrv.sys). And the service AvastVBoxSvc also with the missing image (C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\ng\vbox\AvastVBoxSVC.exe).

The problem is that both registry keys are somehow protected and I can’t delete them even elevated as an administrator.

It’s possible it doesn’t cause any problems, but I don’t like such remnants in my system.

Not much use to post in a 9(!) month old dead thread as many things have changed since then.

You need to disable Avast self-defense first.

Great, you’re right. I didn’t know about that setting. I was able to remove both the service and the driver after disabling of that setting.

Do you know why those two components were still there? Were they just remains after any previous versions the installer failed to remove?

And do you know any details about how virtualization (e.g. the sandbox) is implemented now? Was the solution with VirtualBox abandoned?

This was part of the NG system of virtualisation on the users system. Many found that their system was either not up to the task of running NG or slowed the system down.

Avast has now implemented a system that is avast cloud based, CyberCapture, so the scanning/virtualisation is done in the cloud, with little impact or no on the users system. See https://blog.avast.com/cybercapture-protection-against-zero-second-attacks for more information.