File keeps growing in size

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Hey everyone,

We use Avast Business at the company i work for.  We are having a problem where a few of the users have a file called mstatmerged.gz that gets created in the C:\program data\avast software\avast\spamconf directory.  This file grows in size day by date until it will fill up the users entire hard drive.  On Friday, the file on my office pc was at 400MB and today, Monday, it is already at 48GB.  The only way i have found to get rid of it is to uninstall Avast.  After i reinstall Avast the file gets recreated and the vicious cycle starts over.  In about 40 installations we have only found this so far in 5, at least at the facility i work at.  Has anyone here ever seen this file or can tell me what causes it?  I think it has something to do with Outlook or a spam filter.

Thanks!

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Update on troubleshooting:

I disabled all of the avast shields including Antispam and the file size kept growing while refreshing the folder.  I fully closed out Outlook and it still kept growing.  I then restarted the computer which activated back all of the shields.  I checked the file and it wasn't growing.  I opened Outlook and it still has not grown any since restarting the computer.  This is not the first time the computer has been restarted since avast has been installed, so now i'm just continuously checking the file to see when it starts growing again.

[Artur80]

Disable web shields and check again. My one was 185GB believe or not. That's insane.

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I have everything enabled right now and it still hasn't grown since the restart.  I'm not sure yet what triggers it to start growing.  I'm glad i'm not the only one that has seen this.

One of the computers here had the file at 400GB and filled up a 500GB hard drive.  As soon as i uninstalled Avast the file went away and the space was free again.

[Eddy]

Not sure if it will work, but give a try (if the business edition has that file too) > https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=190794.msg1338970#msg1338970

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Thanks for the link but that didn't apply.  The file spamcatcher.conf doesn't exist in the folder.  I also tried what they mentioned about turning off the avast self defense and deleting the file but i still couldn't delete the mstatmerged.gz file.  Windows says it is opened by Avast and cannot be deleted.

The weird thing to me is that i have the same Avast for Business installed on all of the computers here.  They are all installed from the same executable file and they are managed by the cloud, but only a few have actually even got this file.  There is another computer in my office with the same Avast on it and does not have the file at all.

[Eddy]

As it is a business version, disabling the self defense need to be done (if it has such a option) from the console as the console overwrites the local settings.

[REDACTED]

I was able to turn it off locally, but i'll also try from the console.

Also, if this information helps any i'm using Avast Business Security 12.3.2515 (Build 12.3.3154.23)

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Just to give an update, i have still not successfully figured out what causes this or how to delete the file without uninstalling Avast. 

I found some of the computers here had the file errormerged.gz that was growing in size instead of mstatmerged.gz.  So, there are at least two files that can cause this problem.  I also noticed that the spamconf folder seems to be pretty random with what files are populated in it.  I rarely saw the exact same file makeup when looking through 45 installations. 

I will update this post if we ever figure out what causes this or how we fixed it.

[Asyn]

Contact business support: https://support.business.avast.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

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I wanted to post an update now that we found out what was causing the problem just in case someone else runs into this. 

It was the anti spam feature in avast business.  We found out there was a bad anti spam definition that was released but this how now been fixed by Avast.

We reinstalled Avast Business on the computers that had this problem and they received the new anti spam update.  We haven't had the files populate or the size grow since. 

So, if you run across a PC with the large files in the spamconf folder, just uninstall Avast, make sure your avast cloud is fully updated and then reinstall Avast.  We temporary turned off the Anti Spam feature until the new update was released and this also stopped the problem from happening.