Thanks Avast

[Matt_Matt]

Do to the false positive last night, i had to reformat my computer....thanks you for nothing
 

[DavidR]

Talk about a massive over reaction, reformat.

Whilst there is no doubt this was a huge pain in the rear, no way it should have required a reformat to resolve. Even if you deleted all the files detected (never a good option without full investigation) it wouldn't have touched the system files (certainly none reported in the topics I viewed).

Deletion isn't really a good first option (you have none left), 'first do no harm' don't delete, send virus to the chest and investigate.

There is no rush to delete anything from the chest, a protected area where it can do no harm. Anything that you send to the chest you should leave there for a few weeks. If after that time you have suffered no adverse effects from moving these to the chest, scan them again (inside the chest) and if they are still detected as viruses, delete them.

Restore a false positive from avast chest (version avast 4., see http://support.avast.com/index.php?_m=knowledgebase&_a=viewarticle&kbarticleid=376.

[Hermite15]

I guess another big issue here (like it happened with Comodo a few weeks ago) will be the amount of noobs running their computer on one unique partition, and saving their stuff very naturally on the Windows drive There might be a need to reformat and reinstall after such a disaster, depending on what was affected, and restoration options, but those complaining that they lost personal data can only blame themselves for, once again, saving it on drive C:/  

[Alan|Cvette]

I see what David is saying. Reformat is a huge over reaction. I have had issues with my PC (not from Avast!), but my mindset is that anything can be fixed and or repaired with some time and patience and if your personal files and programs are valuable to you its worth the time to try and fix the issue.

Also, as a good rule of thumb. Always investigate (I.E Google) the files. Keep files in the chest for a week or more before deletion.

[Matt_Matt]

yeah, i really should have done that. it was just that i had an infection with Virut a year ago, and the only option back then was to reformat.
So when avast started detecting a huge number of my programs and files as infected, I had a flashback, and i just hit the kill switch.

...sigh...i should have saved my files on removable media first.
now its all gone 

[Hermite15]

yeah, i really should have done that. it was just that i had an infection with Virut a year ago, and the only option back then was to reformat.
So when avast started detecting a huge number of my programs and files as infected, I had a flashback, and i just hit the kill switch.

...sigh...i should have saved my files on removable media first.
now its all gone 

not necessarily on removable media (that's for backup), but on a separate partition on the same disk 

[Alan|Cvette]

yeah, i really should have done that. it was just that i had an infection with Virut a year ago, and the only option back then was to reformat.
So when avast started detecting a huge number of my programs and files as infected, I had a flashback, and i just hit the kill switch.

...sigh...i should have saved my files on removable media first.
now its all gone 

I've been in your position though, it does suck. An external hard drive is a great idea, pretty cheap too. Best of luck to you Matt_Matt.

[Joe S]

Kind of ruined my night too. All the browsers were closed and suddenly the alerts started. One of the main targets was Webroot Spy Sweeper chest which had some tracking cookies then program files. Avast only let me delete files. While I was fighting popups I finally got Spy Sweeper shut down. About then Avast updated and alerts stopped. I figured it was a bad update the way it stopped so suddenly and the forum didn't load.
For safety I uninstalled Spy Sweeper ran their removal tool. I did the same for Avast. Then I installed Avast and then Spy Sweeper. I didn't want any damaged or corrupt files.
Joe

[Vlk]

Kind of ruined my night too. All the browsers were closed and suddenly the alerts started. One of the main targets was Webroot Spy Sweeper chest which had some tracking cookies then program files. Avast only let me delete files. While I was fighting popups I finally got Spy Sweeper shut down. About then Avast updated and alerts stopped. I figured it was a bad update the way it stopped so suddenly and the forum didn't load.
For safety I uninstalled Spy Sweeper ran their removal tool. I did the same for Avast. Then I installed Avast and then Spy Sweeper. I didn't want any damaged or corrupt files.
Joe

Sounds good, thanks for your patience and accept our apologies.

Vlk

[Joe S]

Something else  I did this afternoon after I saw the Notice here was run System Restore to make sure no other programs were affected. So far everything seems to work fine. I hope the Avast quality control puts in a different process to test definitions before public release so this is a one time event.
Joe

[Vlk]

Well, as a matter of fact, the process is quite good but problems start happening when someone decides to not follow it (in an attempt to solve a different, smaller issue)...

[bob3160]

Well, as a matter of fact, the process is quite good but problems start happening when someone decides to not follow it (in an attempt to solve a different, smaller issue)...

Sounds like someone is in the doghouse....

[Chris Thomas]

Who might be responsible for all this blunder?

Someone in Avast

Who is that guy?

[CharleyO]

***

They are not likely to say who. Besides, the name really does not matter to us.
Everyone makes a mistake now and then. The important thing is to learn from the mistakes we make.


***

[Hermite15]

Who might be responsible for all this blunder?

Someone in Avast

Who is that guy?

this is exactly what you shouldn't ask  What would you do if you were in a position to have a word @ Avast, suggest to send the guy to jail, cut one of his hands, crucify him what this question about who did it is a shame. You want a name, address, phone number, beliefs etc...