Avast WEBforum
Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: dloch on July 19, 2021, 04:56:35 PM
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I have recently been getting emails whereby a Threat notification comes up and the email is sent to quarantine and yet these emails are legitimate and from expected sources, one such being shopper@Worldpay.com. When I go into Quarantine to unblock it will not let me recover it, comes up with the erorr 'Whoops, error occured. This file cannot be restored. Close' This is also happening to a friend of mine that uses Avast on my recommendation. Can anyone explain how I can retrieve these emails. I've also tried a reinstall of Avast but same happens when trying to recover quarantined emails. Avast ver 21.5.2470 (build 21.5.6354.680)
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Same thing is happening to me and I can't even read the email in question in thunderbird anymore - it gets marked as *virus* in the subject and nothing of the email shows in the body. Can't restore & exception it either. This is a real show stopper for Avast. If i uninstall avast and put a diff A/V software are my emails lost forever? I just made a purchase online and the confirmation email came in and got sent to quarantine and won't restore so this is def a false positive. One other thing - AOL recently did something on their email servers which cause thunderbird to reload all emails from server back onto client on my desktop. While these were reloading several got sent to quarantine even though they had been their from before without issue in the past. Can anyone help with this b/c it is apparently happening to others too. At this point a fix doesn't matter unless it's fool-proof. Instead I wanna recover my emails and uninstall Avast b/c this is intolerable (never had a prob like this with any other A/V software (mostly used avg). There has to be some override mechanism to restore and exception these false positive emails getting quarantined. Also is there some way to tell Avast to not scan thunderbird?!? TIA
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Also same ver here = Avast ver 21.5.2470 (build 21.5.6354.680)
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Can anyone from AVAST help with this!! How can we get the attention of AVAST tech support to assist with this? Please! TIA
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Also is there some way to tell Avast to not scan thunderbird?!?
Turn off mail shield i guess?
Scroll down to Manage individual shield settings and select Mail shield
https://support.avast.com/en-eu/article/Antivirus-shield-settings/
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yes, and thanks! Had already done that so no more emails will get absconded; now to restore my emails. It might be that I have to remove avast entirely (good riddance) and then maybe delete/remove the emails in the client that got tagged as **VIRUS** in the subject in such away that they don't delete from the imap server and then re-fetch them, somehow lol. ::)
PS - In all fairness avast has been very good for many yrs here (ymmv) up until this email fiasco has surfaced, but no longer.
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I've still got this same problem and still unable to recover my quarantined files. I've tried repairing Avast, un-installing and re-installing Avast and there's also been a new update today 1st Aug 2021, but still the same problem exists with the error 'Whoops, error occurred. This file cannot be restored. Close' I've sent the file for analysis and explained all this but still no resolution in site. I'm using Win 10 pro. Is there anyone out there that can help, it's very frustrating.
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Hi,
Also is there some way to tell Avast to not scan thunderbird?!?
Turn off mail shield i guess?
Yes, it's a solution, but the best solution would be for avast to look into the matter because it's not normal for users not to be able to recover quarantined emails, especially when they are false positives.
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I've still got this same problem and still unable to recover my quarantined files. I've tried repairing Avast, un-installing and re-installing Avast and there's also been a new update today 1st Aug 2021, but still the same problem exists with the error 'Whoops, error occurred. This file cannot be restored. Close' I've sent the file for analysis and explained all this but still no resolution in site. I'm using Win 10 pro. Is there anyone out there that can help, it's very frustrating.
1. Enable debug logging (Menu > Settings > General > Troubleshooting > Enable debug logging) and reproduce the issue.
2. Follow instructions: https://support.avast.com/article/33/ and post the File-ID or name of the Support-File here afterwards.
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Hi,
Also is there some way to tell Avast to not scan thunderbird?!?
Turn off mail shield i guess?
Yes, it's a solution, but the best solution would be for avast to look into the matter because it's not normal for users not to be able to recover quarantined emails, especially when they are false positives.
The problem is that in some email clients, emails aren't stored as individual files within a folder, but as part of a compressed archive format.
For instance the whole folder 'InBox' is just an archive file and not a folder as in the windows explorer sense. So emails have to be inserted into that compressed archive file/folder. Now the email client can do that gracefully without issue (as it knows what format, etc.), but another program trying to do that from the outside could well corrupt that archive with the loss of all emails in that archive, not just that email. It is also my practice not to store lots of emails in InBox for this and other reasons (system crash, etc.).
The other issue is, because the Mail Shield is acting as a man in the middle, it intercepts the email to scan it before it gets into the email folder/file archive, It can't easily just place it into the InBox folder if it is a compressed archive.
I have my settings, not to take any autonomous action but to Ask (in all shields) and I make the decision what to do. I also vet my emails (Mail Washer) before allowing them passage to the email client (Thunderbird).
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Thanks for the response. Unfortunately Asyn, the debuggung tool option isn't available in the Free Avast version.
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Thanks for the response. Unfortunately Asyn, the debuggung tool option isn't available in the Free Avast version.
It should be available for all products, as essentially it gathers information on possible bugs and uploads it to avast. Fixing problems is good for all products, free or paid.
Where do you find it isn't available in the Free Avast version ?
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Asyn, Re the debugging tool, I get as far as enabling debug logging but when I come to follow the instructions given in the URL link you mention I get as far as Menu>Settings>General>Troubleshooting but there is no entry ‘’Send logs to our support team’, the last entry is ‘Enable debug logging’ which I have ticked. As an alternative offered by Avast, I’ve down loaded the Avast Support Tool and run as administrator and generated a support file that has automatically been uploaded to Avast, so I presume Avast now has that result and I have a File ID . You mentioned posting that ID number on here but is it secure, there seems to be an awful lot of info in the file, or is it only Avast that can access this file?
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Posting the ID number, it is secure, what it does is enable the Avast Support team to find your support file and link it to this topic.
Only avast team members have access to the support tickets and support file info.
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Thanks David, the Support ID is 4AQGR
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You're welcome,
Hopefully one of the Avast Team can pick it up now.
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Thanks David, the Support ID is 4AQGR
Hi, I forwarded it, let's see...
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According to Avast, the best answer was already provided by DavidR.
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=290723.msg1642153#msg1642153
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According to Avast, the best answer was already provided by DavidR.
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=290723.msg1642153#msg1642153
Nice of them to notice ;)
What would also be nice would be to put this in their FAQs and/or include in the Mail Shield FAQ, Tutorial.
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Hi everyone and thanks for all your input. I’ve had a response from Avast requesting some further details, which I have provided so just waiting for a follow-up to that.
I would mention that I have got my settings set to ‘Ask’ in all core shields but emails detected with a threat still go straight into quarantine and all I get into my Outlook is notification that the email has been blocked, so unfortunately this wasn’t a solution for me. I have noticed that the emails that are blocked on the PC do come into my ipad without problem, but I don’t have Avast on there. I have also got my settings in Outlook to leave a copy of the mail on the server webmail (Bt) so I am able to get around the problem if it’s a false positive. I have tried receiving the affected mail on another old redundant client software that I have - which is Windows Live Mail – and still get the same results of being unable to retrieve from quarantine. Maybe its just something I’ll have to live with if the retrieving of quarantined mail is not possible when using my client software Outlook 365.
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Hi,
Someone said on the French forum that the "Avast MS Outlook Plugin" toolbar allows to manage emails before the avast mail shield quarantines them.
But, I don't use it and this person is having problems with this plugin since the last windows update.
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=291854.msg1642024#msg1642024
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Thanks for that info from the French Forum, I’ve had a look at the discussion and must admit I’m totally unfamiliar with the Outlook Plug-in for Avast – didn’t even know it existed and at present wouldn’t know where to find it - so will need to investigate further. It would appear from reading this particular discussion on the French Forum that there is certainly a problem with Avast causing quite a few different ‘ False Positives’ and I think the ball is firmly in their court on this particular aspect of the problem. I have been using PC’s since they first became available to the general public and can’t ever recall a ‘real virus’ entering my PC, I’ve only ever had False Positives and always been able to deal with them by releasing from quarantine, and I started using Outlook Express, then Windows live mail, then Outlook stand-alone and now Outlook 365 so it’s strange that this problem has suddenly reared it’s head, a shame when I’ve used Avast for as long as I can remember and always recommended to friends and colleagues.
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Just found the Pug-in and it is active but it would appear Avast no longer use this plug-in.
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Hi,
I'm sorry you're having trouble with avast. Can you please provide the Alert ID, which you can find in the bottom left corner of the detection dialog if it reappears?
Thank you in advance,
HK
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Just found the Pug-in and it is active but it would appear Avast no longer use this plug-in.
I couldn't be more helpful on this plugin that I don't use.
The member there seems to say that his problem is recent, and I don't know if it's avast or Outlook that doesn't use this plugin anymore or if it's a MS bug with the toolbar.
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Hi HK
Alert ID for most recent 'Threat secured' notification is fbcc292a79d5
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Thanks a lot for the Alert ID, the detection was false positive and should not appear again. Please accept my apology for the trouble the mailshield has caused you.
Best regards,
HK
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Thanks HK for fixing the false positive issue. Am I to assume that I'll have to live with the other issue of being unable to recover quarantined mail due to the link between Avast and Outlook 365?
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In general, the Mail Shield works on network level - so the quarantined email cannot be put "back" so that the email client would receive it (again). It may be different in case of Outlook plugin, but it's still not possible to put the mail back into the mailbox.
So, the "Restore" option won't work.
You can try to "Extract" option though - it should copy the quarantined file into the folder of your choice. Now I'm not sure what file exactly it's gonna be - if it's the actual email (body and the rest), try renaming the file to .eml extension - maybe the email client would be able to open it then?
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Hi Igor. Thanks for the tip. I wasn't able to read the extracted file in either 'Notepad' or 'Word Pad' nor by adding the extension of .eml to the file, but, it does open perfectly in MS Word, so this does get around the problem of not being able to restore back into Outlook. So anyone else out there reading this who has the same issue and wants to read their email that's in Quarantine, just extract the file and add the extension .doc or .docx and the file opens and is perfectly readable in MS Word.
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I’ve suddenly started having a *huge* amount of trouble in the last few days. The mail shield is triggering hundreds of times an hour, with a good many of these false alerts being to Wayfair and B&H emails. I can’t move the alert box, and it triggers do often I can’t do anything on my computer as long as Thunderbird is running. I’ve now started unsubcribing from multiple lists.
When that’s compounded with the increasing number of Avast nags to upgrade, my take is that the best solution is to scrape this barnacle off the boat and go with a different product.
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Hi - Just an update - after sending a sample email in question from quarantine, Avast generously got back to say, "Our virus specialists have been working on this problem and it has been resolved. Detection should not be appearing anymore."