Windows 10: one of my desktop shortcuts has a green checkmark, why ?

As the title says. It happens to only one of many shortcuts I have on the desktop.
Wonder why and how do I fix that? I have tried restart. That did not fix it.
I have only Windows Defender. No other av program installed.




:)

 

Mysterious green checkmarks on desktop


In the past week or so, I have noticed that the shortcuts (aliases) on my desktop are being festooned with tiny green checkmarks. For example, last time I started up my Windows VM, I saw:





Now, just passing my cursor OVER the aliases (not even clicking) made each of the checkmarks (plus some other icons) change to Xs:





and currently, in a VM which has been running for a couple days, I have neither checkmarks nor Xs on these shortcuts, just the standard little curvy arrow shortcut symbol.

I've Googled the syndrome, and the common response is that this is a Norton Backup artefact. But I have never installed Norton or any other backup (I just backup the whole VM outside Windows). I use MS's Defender anti-virus, and run MalwareBytes Anti-Rootkit in the background — my other anti-viruses are "launch manually to run" types.

Does anybody know what Lassie is trying to tell me, here?

 

Mysterious green checkmarks on desktop


If it was a common Windows bug, I think we'd have heard of it. Rather than blaming MS at this point, try a process of elimination if the suggestions above about 3rd party programs and your own research don't prompt an idea.

1. Does it happen in Safe Mode? If no, then
2. Does it happen after a clean boot? If no, then (it's not MS's fault)
3. progressively enable startups until it recurs.

Otherwise, what happens if you create a new user for test purposes- does it happen then?
If no, then it's something configured under the other user's profile or running then that isn't when logged in as the new user.

Follow a process of elimination.

This looks very much like what you're seeing:
windows 10 - What are these green checkmarks on my Desktop icons? - Super User

 

Mysterious green checkmarks on desktop


Same situation as philostow, shortcut icons change from arrow to either nothing, a grey x or a green dot with checkmark. Never had any of the various programs suggested here. It happens to my machine multiple times a day and a refresh command always gets the default arrow back. I've checked the Registry entry that governs this and it's set to arrow and retains that setting even when the arrows are missing or replaced.

At this point I've decided to log the state of the Desktop and as soon as I notice it has changed I plan to use Nirsoft's Last Activity View and see if I can tell what processed have run since the change. Maybe it's some other program or activity built into Win10.