Author Topic: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest  (Read 1681 times)

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Offline snowy.huskybutt

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Hello there!

I've recently noticed an issue that doesn't seem to have been resolved with the newest update to AVAST, I've already tried repairing the program too with no change unfortunately.

I have an item that was falsely flagged and placed within the Quarantine Chest a couple of days prior and tried to remove it but clicking on the delete option does absolutely nothing. I never used to have a problem with this but it seems to have become an issue from one of the recent updates and it's a bit annoying.

Is there any way to fix this at all or could someone verify that it's a bug and have it reported to be fixed please? I spotted other posts floating around on the forums too mentioning this issue saying it's related to the Behaviour Shield.

Some information or help would be very much appreciated!

Offline r@vast

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #1 on: November 01, 2021, 03:06:53 PM »
Hi,

I wasn't able to reproduce it. Can you please upload a screenshot of your virus chest and also provide us with a Support file ID?
https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/Submit-support-file
 

Offline snowy.huskybutt

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #2 on: November 01, 2021, 03:50:59 PM »
Hello again, I submitted a ticket with the screenshot attached with the problem I'm having.

The Support File ID is: 1PAKH

Hopefully this helps, and I'm able to fix it without much issue. Only other option I can think of is possibly uninstalling and reinstalling AVAST at this point since repairing didn't help.

Offline Janie7

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #3 on: November 01, 2021, 04:10:55 PM »
Can you tell me how to access/view the list of files in the Virus Chest please.

I have many "missing" files and want to know if they have been moved to Virus Chest.

Thank you.

Offline Asyn

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #4 on: November 01, 2021, 04:40:24 PM »
Can you tell me how to access/view the list of files in the Virus Chest please.
Using the Virus Chest: https://support.avast.com/article/21/
W8.1 [x64] - Avast Free AV 23.3.8047.BC [UI.757] - Firefox ESR 102.9 [NS/uBO/PB] - Thunderbird 102.9.1
Avast-Tools: Secure Browser 109.0 - Cleanup 23.1 - SecureLine 5.18 - DriverUpdater 23.1 - CCleaner 6.01
Avast Wissenswertes (Downloads, Anleitungen & Infos): https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=60523.0

Offline InvisibleMan

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #5 on: November 01, 2021, 05:00:55 PM »
Hi,

I wasn't able to reproduce it. Can you please upload a screenshot of your virus chest and also provide us with a Support file ID?
https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/Submit-support-file
Hello.

I already reported the same problem not so long ago, but it got fully ignored.

I even provided File ID with debug logs enabled.

Here's that thread with all the info about it and my report:
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=306359.0

I also saw many other similar reports in the past here.

I think that various things could trigger this issue that makes it impossible to clear the Virus Chest.

So I think the easiest way to solve it is not to try to determine the cause, but to give the program (in future updates) the ability to forcefully remove the entry from the Virus Chest (even if it takes adding and extra option in the dropdown menu there: "Remove Forcefully forever" or something like that).
« Last Edit: November 01, 2021, 05:04:33 PM by InvisibleMan »

Offline snowy.huskybutt

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #6 on: November 01, 2021, 05:04:17 PM »
Hi,

I wasn't able to reproduce it. Can you please upload a screenshot of your virus chest and also provide us with a Support file ID?
https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/Submit-support-file
Hello.

I already reported the same problem not so long ago, but it got fully ignored.

I even provided File ID with debug logs enabled.

Here's that thread: https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=306359.0


I actually saw your post yesterday and I'm glad I'm not the only person experiencing this issue. I never USED to have this problem until recently so I don't know what's caused it to happen, but nothing will fix it either. And I know it's not a problem on my end since I never mess with any core files.

Offline InvisibleMan

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #7 on: November 01, 2021, 05:51:31 PM »
While I still hope that there would be a fix in the future verisons that would allow to remove such stuck files...

...here is how I managed to remove a stuck file from the Virus Chest in the similar situation
(on Windows 7 64-bit SP1):


1. Find a file "index.xml" here
Code: [Select]
C:\ProgramData\Avast Software\Avast\chest(If you don't have visible extensions enabled in your Windows, you can verify it's an xml file by right clicking on it and looking into its propreties).

If there's no such file in that location, try to search for the "chest" folder on your system drive, until you find it.

I recommend enabling showing of hidden files in your Folder properties (you can google search how to do it on your OS).

2. Temporarily disable the self-defense of Avast
(Go into Settings > Troubleshooting and then uncheck the "Enable Self-Defense" option, and confirm).

(Don't forget to re-enable the self-defense after you have finished following this guide!)

Also, disable the Behavior Shield (you can re-enable it, if you wish, after you have finished following this guide).

Also, you might want to add into Exceptions the path of your falsely detected file (you can type it in manually if necessary), if you still have the file and wish to keep it.

Make sure to fully close the user interface's window of Avast now.

3. Just in case, make a copy of that file "index.xml" into any other location as a backup, so you can restore it if necessary.

4. Now, open the original file "index.xml" (in its original location)
with a Notepad or any other simple text editor.

You'll see one or more entries there, in this fashion (XML structure):



Using the values in blocks "OrigFileName" and "OrigFolder" you can identify your stuck file
(or it could be just one such entry there, if you don't have any other files in your Virus Chest).

For that stuck file,
you only need to change that long string of numbers and letters inside the block called "IDPBlob".
(Don't try to modify the name itself of that block!
And Don't try to change anything else in that file, or it might make things worse.)

Modify a couple of randomly chosen characters in that value (letters or numbers) into some other numbers or English letters.
All that matters, is that the original value there was changed.

Then save these changes in that "index.xml" file.

5. Go to Avast's Virus Chest now, and try to delete / remove that stuck file, by selecting it (checking it) and using the bottom button to access the option to remove it. (Don't use the dropdown menu or button on the file entry field itself).

In my case, it worked!

6.

You can re-enable the self-defense of Avast now in settings > Troubleshooting!

And, if you still wish to continue using the Behavior Shield, you can turn it on again as well.

---

I discovered this solution after multiple tries and errors, experimentally.

Some other ways I tried also seemingly removed the file, but it re-appeared whenever a new file would end up in a chest.

My final solution described above permanently removed a stuck file though.

---

If the solution above didn't have any effect,
do the same thing again, but also do the following operations (while the self-defense of Avast is disabled)
:

1. Remove everything from your Virus Chest, so that only that single stuck file is left there.

2. Enable showing the hidden files in your OS (google search how to do it).

3. On EACH hard drive or SSD you have, in their root, locate the folder named "$AV_ASW", which is hidden by default.

Inside all such located folders find folders named "$VAULT" and inside those find files named "vault.db"

Remove those files from all those folders.

Basically, make sure all those folders have no files in them.

4. Try to remove the stuck file from the Virus Chest again.
« Last Edit: November 01, 2021, 06:18:12 PM by InvisibleMan »

Offline prokopes_

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Re: Unable to interact with items at all within Quarantine/Virus Chest
« Reply #8 on: November 03, 2021, 12:37:31 PM »
Hi snowy.huskybutt, can you please share the content of the following folders with us?
C:\$AV_ASW\$VAULT
C:\ProgramData\Avast Software\Avast\$AV_ASW\$VAULT
C:\ProgramData\Avast Software\Avast\DB

Please note that these folders are "hidden" so you might need to set Windows to show these files: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/view-hidden-files-and-folders-in-windows-97fbc472-c603-9d90-91d0-1166d1d9f4b5#WindowsVersion=Windows_10

Can you add these files into a ZIP file named "14347678.zip" and upload them to our FTP? The steps are described here: https://support.avast.com/en-ww/article/FTP-file-upload

Please let me know when it's done.