Today I started up my browser Firefox 33.1 only to find many, but not all, of my add ons have disappeared and are not listed in the Add-ons Manager anymore. Is there some reason Avast would suddenly dislike most of my Firefox add ons and delete them? Is there a way to tell if Avast was the program to delete them? I have a similar question posted in the Firefox forum at Mozillazine and the common thread was they all were using Avast.
Quote from: lukor on Yesterday at 05:38:08 PM
Hi guys,
thanks to all for the information posted. We have been able to identify the problem now. Browser Cleanup is responsible for this issue. A bug in the component calculating hashes of the extension packages cause (only in some rare cases) deletion of the wrong file - the original instead the packed one.
Sorry for that and thanks again for your help obtaining the repro steps for us.
The Browser Cleanup team is now working on a fix, which will be delivered via a VPS update shortly (tomorrow).
Lukas
So how will I know when is safe to reinstall my add-ons? People, inducing me, seem to be fuzzy about what a "VPS" is exactly. I think it is some sort of virus signature, but since Avast gets several of these a day, I want to know how I'll know which one was the right one.
By way, when I first had this problem, my first thought was I had a virus and I ran a couple scans looking for it. Having an antivirus program make me think I have a virus seems to me to be a very bad thing. It would have been really nice if there were some sort of log that told me what Avast had done so I could know for sure it was overreacting. I looked in the vault and scan history and there was nothing.
UPDATE: November 21, 2014Now that the crisis seems over, I have a few words for Avast.
Putting aside the last few days and the trouble I have been through trying to remember what Firefox add-ons were missing and reinstalling them, the thing that stands out the most about this episode to me is I had no idea how to tell if Avast was deleting my files. I checked Virus Chest and Scan History and they both said nothing. This lead to a panic and scramble to find what malware or virus was capable of attacking Firefox and was strong enough to get past Avast.
The other thing that comes to mind is since Avast could delete things without keeping a record, what other files on my computer might it be deleting? One of the Avast techs said it was caused by Firefox XPI format, but how would I know if Avast didn’t like something else? A few weeks ago Avast took a disliking to a program that has been on my computer for years. At least then I found it in the Virus Chest and could create an exception for it. Now I’m constantly nervous and thinking of switching to another program.
BTW: I know what CAPTCHAS are for, but yours are a lot harder than most I have come across. I'm human and it sometimes still takes me a couple tries.
