Avast! Web Shield blocking access to sites

[L551]

Just a thought - are you using NoScript ?

I am not.

[socialSavant]

Hello there. I have noticed that when Avast's web shield is enabled, it will block access to certain sites. Not all, though. Now this wouldn't be a problem if it were blocking access to bad sites, that would be a good thing. However, when it is active it will block many legitimate sites from being accessed.

These include the avast forums, the mozilla addons site, some reading sites, and some others I can't quite remember at the present time. Avast doesn't give any sort of notification when this happens, so I assume it is a bug of sorts.

Any help would be appreciated, I have turned off Avast's web shield for the time being as a workaround.

Well, considering this is the Avast Mac forum... which it seems a lot of people aren't aware.

Avast! Mac Beta
1.0 35889b
OSX 10.6.8
No other security.

Hello everyone,
I would like to say that L551 isn't crazy. I can reproduce this bug and confirm it completely. I believe the issue may be Mac OSX 10.6.8 Specific. I just downloaded and installed the Avast! Mac Beta v1.0 build 35889b and had the exact same issue using Mac OSX 10.6.8 (Snow Leopard). I do not have another Mac OSX to install and test with, but would gladly install an older build of Avast! Mac Beta if anyone can give me a link to it.

While I am here, I may sound a bit like a troll for this, but I really believe that the support on this thread was terrible. The very first response was from a non-Mac user claiming that it isn't possible that the *MAC BETA* has an odd bug and continued to hold onto this idea that the bug reporter is mistaken somehow. As did most of the other respondents. I would suggest that before you make a statement full of arrogance and based off of NO detailed info from the OP like,

avast! blocks all sites infected it can detect.
It does not block legitimate sites (unless by mistake). They are far from being a lot. You must know and be sure that a lot of "legitimate" sites are hacked and got infected.
Turning off the Web Shield is not recommended at all...

Post dead links to these sites please (change http for hxxp, for instance or add spaces between the url).

The vast majority of malware today is distributed over the web, mostly by means of hacked (otherwise legitimate) sites. The attacker usually injects malicious some scripts into some (or all) pages on the site, waiting for an unsuspecting user to visit the site and possible infect his/her machine.

And this is where avast’s detection capabilities really excel. Its abilities to detect these web-based malicious scripts are second to none, and thanks to the Web Shield and Script Blocking providers, they are used exactly when needed, doing an excellent job stopping the web-based malware right on the entry point.

it would be best to ask for details on the OP's system (though he did eventually ask, it is nice to ask FIRST - Shoot now and ask questions later...). Poor guy was made to look like he is a few crayons short, but in truth nobody bothered to try and reproduce the bug on the same OS with the same build. Don't worry L551, you're not insane. I too have to disable the Web Shield otherwise MOST traffic is stopped by the engine. I have also noticed that it isn't a timeout issue (e.g. the engine works slowly thereby the browser times out first). The browser will IMMEDIATELY state an error about the server closing the connection early. If you guys really want to help and have pride in your software, you will pay attention to the dude using BETA software when he says there is a bug. Seriously,  that is what beta is all about...

My two cents,
socialSavant

[tumic]

Hello everyone,
I would like to say that L551 isn't crazy. I can reproduce this bug and confirm it completely. I believe the issue may be Mac OSX 10.6.8 Specific. I just downloaded and installed the Avast! Mac Beta v1.0 build 35889b and had the exact same issue using Mac OSX 10.6.8 (Snow Leopard). I do not have another Mac OSX to install and test with, but would gladly install an older build of Avast! Mac Beta if anyone can give me a link to it.

Please look into the system log file (/var/log/system.log) and see if there are some proxy error messages when the problem occurs.

While I am here, I may sound a bit like a troll for this, but I really believe that the support on this thread was terrible.

Well, without at least some info, we really can't do anything about any bug.  And a simple statement that the webshield does not work is really not enaugh info to start with...

[socialSavant]

Hello all,
I have found my own solution to the Web Shield issue. First, let me thank tumic for leading me to where I could find the log files. It really wasn't so hard to say something like, "please post your /var/log/system.log." Thank you tumic for being the first to do so. I now have a hypothesis that this problem may be a symptom of novice Mac users and the preinstalled software provided when purchasing the Mac. Being that this is my first foray into OSX and that I am helping my girlfriend out, I was ill informed of the fact that Trend Micro is preinstalled as a trial version. This knowledge would have sped things up tremendously.

After finding the logfile, I noticed that an Avast command was being ignored by the system. Further delving found the "UI" application which was a starter bit for Trend Micro, despite it being disabled by the trial expiration. It would seem that Trend Micro was booting itself up before Avast and creating conflict. A simple uninstall of Trend solved everything. Had I realized that Trend Micro was still installed, I would have trashed it before ever posting anything here. I apologize for my ignorance in this regard. However, even L551 stated that "no other security" was installed. I wonder if novice Mac users are confused about the preinstalled software on their stock machines...

So... L551, you may want to uninstall Trend Micro (or any other security software) that is possibly still lurking around on your comp. I did so by using the Uninstaller application residing in the Trend Micro folder. Also, it would seem that since Trend Micro is being preinstalled on at least one line of recent Macs. Therefore, it might be a good idea to mention it by name when asking newbies if they have "security software installed."

Hopefully, we have all learned a bit about Mac security here and that future builds of Avast will continue to improve to the quality that I am accustomed to and glad for in the Windows versions that I have used for years. Thank you for your help and good bug-hunting,

--socialSavant

[.: Mac :.]

So... L551, you may want to uninstall Trend Micro (or any other security software) that is possibly still lurking around on your comp. I did so by using the Uninstaller application residing in the Trend Micro folder. Also, it would seem that since Trend Micro is being preinstalled on at least one line of recent Macs. Therefore, it might be a good idea to mention it by name when asking newbies if they have "security software installed."

Hello,

Apple does not pre-install any antivirus software on their products. It is possible that it was put there by a Apple Reseller but unlikely if the mac was purchased as a new unopened unit.

[Michael Walsh]

Hello there. I have noticed that when Avast's web shield is enabled, it will block access to certain sites. Not all, though. Now this wouldn't be a problem if it were blocking access to bad sites, that would be a good thing. However, when it is active it will block many legitimate sites from being accessed.

These include the avast forums, the mozilla addons site, some reading sites, and some others I can't quite remember at the present time. Avast doesn't give any sort of notification when this happens, so I assume it is a bug of sorts.

Any help would be appreciated, I have turned off Avast's web shield for the time being as a workaround.

Well, considering this is the Avast Mac forum... which it seems a lot of people aren't aware.

Avast! Mac Beta
1.0 35889b
OSX 10.6.8
No other security.

Hello everyone,
I would like to say that L551 isn't crazy. I can reproduce this bug and confirm it completely. I believe the issue may be Mac OSX 10.6.8 Specific. I just downloaded and installed the Avast! Mac Beta v1.0 build 35889b and had the exact same issue using Mac OSX 10.6.8 (Snow Leopard). I do not have another Mac OSX to install and test with, but would gladly install an older build of Avast! Mac Beta if anyone can give me a link to it.

While I am here, I may sound a bit like a troll for this, but I really believe that the support on this thread was terrible. The very first response was from a non-Mac user claiming that it isn't possible that the *MAC BETA* has an odd bug and continued to hold onto this idea that the bug reporter is mistaken somehow. As did most of the other respondents. I would suggest that before you make a statement full of arrogance and based off of NO detailed info from the OP like,

avast! blocks all sites infected it can detect.
It does not block legitimate sites (unless by mistake). They are far from being a lot. You must know and be sure that a lot of "legitimate" sites are hacked and got infected.
Turning off the Web Shield is not recommended at all...

Post dead links to these sites please (change http for hxxp, for instance or add spaces between the url).

The vast majority of malware today is distributed over the web, mostly by means of hacked (otherwise legitimate) sites. The attacker usually injects malicious some scripts into some (or all) pages on the site, waiting for an unsuspecting user to visit the site and possible infect his/her machine.

And this is where avast’s detection capabilities really excel. Its abilities to detect these web-based malicious scripts are second to none, and thanks to the Web Shield and Script Blocking providers, they are used exactly when needed, doing an excellent job stopping the web-based malware right on the entry point.

it would be best to ask for details on the OP's system (though he did eventually ask, it is nice to ask FIRST - Shoot now and ask questions later...). Poor guy was made to look like he is a few crayons short, but in truth nobody bothered to try and reproduce the bug on the same OS with the same build. Don't worry L551, you're not insane. I too have to disable the Web Shield otherwise MOST traffic is stopped by the engine. I have also noticed that it isn't a timeout issue (e.g. the engine works slowly thereby the browser times out first). The browser will IMMEDIATELY state an error about the server closing the connection early. If you guys really want to help and have pride in your software, you will pay attention to the dude using BETA software when he says there is a bug. Seriously,  that is what beta is all about...

My two cents,
socialSavant

Just downloaded Avast 7.0 for Mac OS X and had this very problem - and I can confirm it's a 10.6.8 thing where an existing Virus program is already in place.

I had Norton Virus Shield running - left it be and installed Avast 7.0.

All browsers (Safari/Firefox/Opera) were blocked from Internet sites. The only way to get access was to disable Web Shield in Avast.

Uninstalled Norton via the uninstall program in Applications - and had to reboot.

Avast working perfectly now - Web Shield enabled and all browsers accessing the Internet properly.