Cannot Delete AWCleaner From Virus Chest?

[The Sniggler]

In looking into the Virus Chest, I noticed that it contains three entries for AWCleaner.exe which I downloaded in December. When I click on the three files, Avast VC asks if I want to delete them, I hit delete, and the files remain... what gives?

[Asyn]

- Which Avast..? (Free/Pro/IS/Premier)
- Which version..?
- OS..? (32/64 Bit..? - which SP/Build..?)
- Other security related software installed..?

[Cluster-Lizard2014]

I would be a little cautious of this if "AWCleaner.exe" is just that and you did not make a posting mistake and meant ADWCleaner.

As far as I have been able to determine "AWCleaner.exe" appears to be an MS "Device Session Cleanup"  tool associated with Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway which allowed secure remote access to corporate networks by employees and clients.

Apparently support for this stopped in 2015 but it was part of all Windows OS versions, including Win10, up to that date.

So it could be or being seen as an OS system file and that is why you can not delete it.

I found a post in another forum, unfortunately in French, but my schoolboy level translation suggested that he too could not delete "AWCleaner" either.

So I'd be very wary of trying to delete it before determining what it is exactly. Knowing why you downloaded it might help and also how it ended up in the AVAST virus chest.
 

[The Sniggler]

I meant the ADW Cleaner, sorry, which I have used for many years, and downloaded from Bleeping Computer in December 2017.
Avast Free
Win7 Home 64 SP1
Only have Avast and MalwareBytes as backup scanner.
No viruses, malware, ect. ever reported. Downloaded ADW for routine end of year scan.

FWIW, I went into Avast in Program Data, found the index file within the virus chest folder, tried to manually delete it, but Avast told I did not have permission to do that.

[Asyn]

Update to the latest version (18.2.2328): https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=216700.0

[The Sniggler]

I am using the current Avast version.

[Asyn]

When I click on the three files, Avast VC asks if I want to delete them, I hit delete, and the files remain... what gives?

Can't confirm the issue. Please post a screenshot.

[Cluster-Lizard2014]

This is a bit unusual then because Malwarebytes ADWCleaner is a portable tool rather than installed. Do you still have ADWCleaner on your PC somewhere? If so I'd delete that and then try deleting it from the Virus Chest.   

But that lead me to think: did you use ADWCleaner from a flash drive or other attached storage device. Is that same device actually still connected? If not then that is likely the problem preventing you from deleting it.  If you or the PC have changed the ID of that device since ie. assigned a new drive letter you'd have the same problem.

If not this then, annoyingly, at the first scan ADWCleaner does create a folder on the root of the primary drive, typically C:\AdwCleaner. This can be deleted as it is regenerated each time so if the above two ideas don't work I'm wondering if doing that may solve the problem.

Have you tried restoring the files to their original location, one at a time and deleting them there in the normal way.

Final suggestion is to start the PC in Safe Mode and try deleting them from the Virus Chest again.

The question all this raises is why did AVAST send this, if that is what it genuinely is, well known adware remover to the virus chest? I would have thought the ADWCleaner would have been more likely to flag AVAST as problem rather than the other way around.

Only joking

[The Sniggler]

I tried safe mode, Avast would not load .

What I wound up doing was simply a clean install of Avast and now  the virus chest is empty.

Thanks for the replies..

[Asyn]

You're welcome.