AVAST can't scan some files

[larry38]

Last night I scanned my hdd using AVAST and it listed 1437 lines that it couldn't scan for the following reason: "Archive is password protected." All of the files were on the C: drive with none of the other partitions showing a problem. Possible action items for the identified files include the following: delete; move; CHEST; and scan. Can anyone tell me (1) are these files a problem and (2) what action I should take? Thanks for your help

[Force Flow]

What files did it list?

Others with the same question on other forums have been advised to run malwarebytes and ccleaner.

[juppy]

Avast won't scan archive files unless you put a check in the little box in the scan settings (that box that comes up when you click the hard drive icon and right before you hit Start to begin the scan). Even then it's not a sure-fire thing though, possibly because of password protection, like you mentioned, or something else. I get a list of files every time I scan with it too that says they aren't able to be scanned, but by looking at the address locations in the list I can see that all of the unscannable files are inside the Spybot Search & Destroy directory, so not a problem with those.

That being said, I'd go through and look at the locations of the files it lists and see if there are any suspicious ones or if they're all inside known "good" program directories (like other malware scanners, etc). I used to get a lot of unreadable files with Steam too for some reason. Not any more though, so don't know what happened there.

[larry38]

Thanks for the replies, guys. About half of the files are in the spybot - search and destroy directory, however others are in a Yahoo quarantine directory and others are in a recycler\nprotect directory. I guess I should just leave them alone and next time I scan I'll try to check the box as suggested by juppy. Thanks again for the help.

[glc]

Delete Spybot's backups and empty its quarantine, empty the Yahoo quarantine, and empty the Norton protected recycle bin.

[larry38]

Thanks, GLC. I thought I could do that but was afraid to until one of you guys said it would be ok to do so. I'll do that now.