Avira sent out a defective antivirus update that is causing paid versions of its product to block critical Windows processes and third-party software, effectively rendering millions of PCs unusable.The update bumps the software version to 8.2.10.64 and the definitions file to 7.11.30.24. The result is that the AntiVirProActiv component starts detecting critical processes as malware, including the following:
dllhost.exe
explorer.exe
iexplorer.exe
notepad.exe
regedit.exe
rundll32.exe
taskeng.exe
wuauclt.exe
Those are just some of the false detected Windows processes. Avira sometimes kills them and stops Windows from booting, but that’s not the end of it.
The update is also blocking other Microsoft software (such as Microsoft Office and Microsoft Works) as well as various third-party applications, including Byki 4 Express, Documents To Go, Garmin, Google Talk, iPod and Palm services, Opera, OpenDNS Updater, Polipo, Shadow, Stickies, and many others. In other words, almost every executable file is being falsely detected by this update.
The free edition (Avira AntiVir Personal) does not include ProActiv, so it is not affected!
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