Windows Defender, "Items Skipped During Scan"

Anonymous
2020-03-10T15:47:27+00:00

I keep getting this notification after quick scans, "Windows Defender skipped an item due to exclusions or network protection settings."

To make this clear: I don't have ANY exclusions, and as far as I'm aware, I haven't changed my network protection settings in the past. 

What's going on? Is this malware, or a bug with the new update? How do I fix this? I want to be reassured that I'm safe, this isn't very reassuring.

EDIT: Thank you to Techradar for bringing this issue to light. If any employees read this, could you perhaps re-title it in a way which doesn't make users feel so endangered by the bug? All of us have come to the conlusion that (especially with MBAM) we should be clear.

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Security and privacy

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Günter Born 49,461 Reputation points
2020-03-25T08:23:30+00:00

Microsoft has released an update to fix that behavior, see Update KB4052623: Microsoft fixes Defender ScanSkip Bug. See also the marked answer.

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  1. JuliaMarvin 22,805 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2020-03-24T03:43:52+00:00

    Personally, Im wondering about all those WD bugs and issues....

    I'm using a 3rd party product, so I don't know if people posting here in Microsoft Community do indeed have problems with WD or are just kind of 'overreacting' on whatever WD glitches...

    When I got a new PC with Win 10 a few months ago, I used WD for about a week.

    Unfortunately I verrrry soon ran into all kinds of (minor) issues with WD such as WD seemingly building hurdles to whatever I wanted to do and it wouldn't reliable auto-update/-scan etc etc etc.

    Reading some threads here in Microsoft Community, I'm really often surprised about alll those really weird 'threat' handling (or not?) messages users are asking about...

    Judging by the threads here in MC, WD does not seem to be the most 'user-friendly' 'AV'-program....

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-03-24T01:20:05+00:00

    After discussing this behavior within my blog Windows 10: Defender skips elements during scan, the reason for the message became clear. Defender avoids to scan network files (I postulate, that Microsoft has changed that recently). 

    You can ignore the warning - or you may use the workaround discussed within my blog post Windows 10: Fix for skipped Defender scans

    HTH

    Wow, that worked for me (Fix #1) on my Windows 10 VM. I am going to try it elsewhere (may try Fix #3 instead). Thanks!

    Fix #3 (I had to give 1 as the parameter) did not work on my work PC. Fix #1 did, but due to Microsoft's recommendation that scanning network files should not be enabled, I undid the group policy change. Thank you for your blog post, GBorn, and I hope Microsoft addresses this issue quickly. At least I feel better about it now.

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-03-24T01:00:08+00:00

    What is bizarre is the fact that it doesnt indicate which attempted file was skipped.  This lends to concern as I expected it would show which file it was so that I could confirm.

    I considered the network element, but ince I had no network shares mapped, I didnt pursue it further.

    I also did a registry clean to see if there were any residual mapping and still the same outcome.

    A log would be good as it only seems to do this when I perform a full scan or following an offline scan.

    I would like microsoft to come forward with the final answer.  If it is a big and not an exploit, it would ease minds somewhat better.

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-03-24T00:59:59+00:00

    After discussing this behavior within my blog Windows 10: Defender skips elements during scan, the reason for the message became clear. Defender avoids to scan network files (I postulate, that Microsoft has changed that recently). 

    You can ignore the warning - or you may use the workaround discussed within my blog post Windows 10: Fix for skipped Defender scans

    HTH

    Wow, that worked for me (Fix #1) on my Windows 10 VM. I am going to try it elsewhere (may try Fix #3 instead). Thanks!

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