McAfee virus scan.

Something odd happened, and I wish somebody could help me understand. Windows gave me an alert about a particular process being shut down (I think related to Media Player, I'm not sure as I didn't think it was important) and then came up with with a 'problem reports and solutions' window, advising that 'McAfee virus scan has stopped working properly' and recommending to go online to the McAfee support site. I have never ever installed any McAfee product, am I missing something? Thanks in advance.

 

Is McAfee showing in the security center as it was installed.I remember something about vista with false security in the security center,but cant exactly remember what caused it.

 

I googled it and not many hits as I expected. Some people experienced it but they had installed McAfee in the past. My Vista was bought boxed, and I certainly never installed McAfee, not even to test it. I searched the registry entries without any results, and I'm scanning my computer at the moment with MBAM. I'm pretty sure I'm clean, and there were no outbound calls recorded by Look'n'Stop. Quite bizarre, unless something was pickedup while browsing sandboxed and prompted a Windows alert.

 

Have you updated Adobe Flash recently?
I got a McAfee scanner installed with the update. It's an opt out thats included.

 

I read about that, but if thats was the case he would have found it in his registry.

 

Hey,

Not necessarily because you do a Windows Registry search and this search does not yield any entries named “McAfee” it means that McAfee VS or any other product related to McAfee were not installed on the PC.

I've seen cryptic Windows Registry entries that don't have McAfee's name on them but they actually belong to a past McAfee installations. Examples:


[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\00534BDFF73EF4741B9DE248FF053E6B
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\02C5303ECDC471C4E979719F11401D4C
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\02D4AED8B1D30ED49889C6243467E1C0
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\035C83C043B311147A5883F13439611E
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\051908A3443BCF041AF8A50D9218D767


All the above entries belong to a McAfee installation but they do not have that name on them and sometimes, we might overlook them and later they come back to haunt us causing software conflicts and BSODs.

That's why when I install Windows and Office from scratch, I only install the critical updates and service packs from Windows Update and then some other applications such as PDF readers, compression utilities such as WinRar, browsers such as Firefox, flash player, Java SE runtime, etc., but NO anti-virus, NO firewalls, NO anti-executables, NO anti-malware, NO sandbox programs. Anything that hooks deeply on Windows.

The Windows image I create to reload on my PC on case of disaster or software incompatibility is made from the snapshot when I install everything except any Security Applications like the ones aforementioned above.


Hope this helps.

 

You know you might be on to something, I haven't thought about Flash, and yes, I've had several updates lately, but I've never seen any mention of McAfee scanner. I've just finished scanning with MBAM and the Avira rescue CD with no detection whatsoever. I'll try to search the registry again as suggested by Zyrtec.
@ Zyrtec
How did you identify those entries as belonging to McAfee?

 

@Osaban,

I found them from this article:


---https://kc.mcafee.com/corporate/index?page=content&id=KB59996---


Just look at the bottom part of that page and you will find out how many, many orphan registry entries are left behind by that McAfee installation [VirusScan Enterprise in this case]. Although, it might happen with any McAfee home installations since they share the same core components.


Regards.

 

Thanks Zyrtec, I've checked your article. Unfortunately when I went to the corresponding registry sections (like [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Components\00534BDFF73EF4741B9DE248FF053E6B) there are literally zillions of similar entries, it would take hours to check them all).
I am absolutely certain that I never installed anything from McAfee.

 

How can I check whether the McAfee scanner has been installed with Adobe Flash?

 

I got the same message "Problem Reports and Solutions" directing me to the McAfee web site to fix a problem with McAfee. I went to their site and downloaded Virtual Technician to scan and fix the problem with my McAfee product. The scan said "No products found" That was a relief. I thought my wife had infected my computer with the virus McAfee.

I went to Problem Reports and Solutions in the Control Panel and clicked view problem history. I right clicked on Solution Availabel for Windows Media Center Store Update Manager and selected View solution and it was to go to McAfee?

I think it might be a problem with Microsoft and not McAfee. Although my Adobe flash player keeps crashing and wanting updates? hummm!!

 

Maybe this tool will do the job:
http://majorgeeks.com/McAfee_Consumer_Product_Removal_Tool_d5420.html

 

in the programs and features dialog (if that's what it's called in vista, i use w7) - it'll be listed as mcafee security scan iirc.

 

Thanks, but that was one of the first things I checked. No, I know I have never installed anything from McAfee, I like to think that something was picked up while browsing which triggered the MS alert. It hasn't happened again therefore it must have been a fluke. Persnickety (post #11) had the same experience, and I mentioned something to do with media player in my first post, it was actually media centre as I don't ever use media player.

 

maybe there's a component (dll, module, whatever) of media center that has the same name as a mcafee product component and confused the windows solutions dingus. easiest way to figure it out would be to look in event viewer.

 

m0unds is correct.

mcupdate.exe

To do with Windows Media Center Store Update Manager, and also the name of a McAfee file.

 

You are both probably right, odd though that Windows reports a problem associated to one of its own applications.