Windows 10: Current threat scan Windows defender

Show no violation or problems but scans only 12 files?

:)

 

Windows Defender keeps taking action on nonexistent threats on nonexistent scans

I have a laptop (Dell Inspiron 3541) running Windows 10 v1803. Recently, I have been getting notifications from Windows Defender saying threats were found and removed on scnas that didn't happen.

Some of the notifications are:

and

When I go to Windows Defender, it doesn't show any threats found - nor does it even show a recent scan. For example, I got one of the above notifications today, and this is what Windows Defender showed.





I tried running a scan, but the ETA was 4 hours, then 20, then 70, and still kept going up.

Is there a way I can find out what the "threats" are? Or make it stop sending these unnecessary notifications?

 

Windows defender false positive - forced to allow threat


Windows defender has started to identify C:\Windows\System32\mshta.exe as a threat [normally reported as a Trojan Powessere.G]. I use mshta.exe to run an hta custom MsgBox - I have been hoping to keep using my current CustomMsgBox tool [batch file calling a vbs-hta file] until later this year when I hope to have had enough time to replace it with a PowerShell alternative.

Windows defender's notification lets me "allow the threat" but that seems to me to be a bigger security hole than is necessary - it will now ignore a potentially real intrusion when all I want to run is a genuine Windows component. My immediate problem is fixed but I would prefer to fix the false positive using the exclusions list.

I cleared the 'Allowed threats history' so I could use the exclusions list instead. I added C:\Windows\System32\mshta.exe to the file exclusions list and I checked that it had taken properly by checking the exclusions list both in the UI & in the Registry. But the exclusion made no difference, it continued to detect and block the exe.

I have repeated the attempt several times [by clearing the allowed threats list & exclusions list beforehand] and the results are the same every time
- allowing the threat works,
- using the exclusions list has no effect.

I studied the relevant tutorial but have not spotted an error in what I have been doing - Add or Remove Windows Defender Exclusions

Does anybody with experience of using the exclusions list to counter false positives have any suggestions for me?

Denis

 

Windows 10 Defender scan

You should be wary about attempting to follow any the steps in the article cited above
<post has been deleted> since this article applies strictly to the use of the old version of Windows Defender in Windows XP.

Here’s a troubleshooting guide that was designed for the new version of Windows Defender that’s used in Windows 10:


Windows Defender AV event IDs and error codes

The relevant event IDs for scans appear at the top of the list. You can just let the scan run for a while and then check to see if any events have been recorded.