Advice Request Bitdefender Free, why you do this to me...

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RejZoR

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Years ago Bitdefender Free had this weird problem where it automatically enabled file extensions, making them visible and that really annoyed me to a point I never used it because of it. Apparently Bitdefender fixed this and I've been running it on all my systems for few days now.

Yesterday I was upgrading my network and connection dropped down for a minute and one of systems sperged where Windows Defender "notification" whining about Bitdefender Free not being "up to date" all of a sudden. Clicked "Update" and nothing happened. Tried removing notification, nothing happened. I just couldn't get rid of the stupid warning about being out of date all of a sudden to a point I just removed it entirely. Again and I'm thinking of just going back to avast! despite everything. All others, despite being good don't match avast! even after all these years because of such dumb nonsense. Guess what, even Kaspersky Cloud Free has the same dumb problems. It's updater is absolutely dumb and using it on a netbook that I use in evenings to watch movies or TV for 1-2 hours before it shuts down with a timer and somehow, Kaspersky fails to update in that 1 hour and always ends up whining over being out of date in 2-3 days time.

I've just been recommending Bitdefender Free on Reddit because of simplicity and then it pulls this ##### on me. Imagine some casual user gets attacked by these warnings and can't get rid of them because someone at Bitdefender didn't think updater through properly? And same goes to you Kaspersky even though this is Bitdefender sub. Why can avast! always update perfectly no matter the time window it has available? It can be 5 minutes, half an hour or 2 hours, it'll always update perfectly. Dropped internet connection? Doesn't matter. It'll wait for it to come back and update then instantly. Why others can't do it so perfectly? People mock avast!, but when it comes to little details like this they really know their ##### and do it properly.
 

Ink

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It may be a known issue or incompatibility with a version of Windows 10.

Did you check or submit feedback on the Bitdefender Forums?

Another member has also suggested AdAware as an alternative to Bitdefender Free.
 

Lenny_Fox

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Avast's company ethics are not better than Microsoft, so maybe this is the right time to try Windows Defender with Simple Windows Hardening and Configure Defender. Even on my previous laptop (with a humble Pentium from 2010), I never noticed update delays with WD.
 

RejZoR

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Windows Defender is still slow as hell and it's Controlled Folder Access is next to useless. I'd rather stick with avast!. I do know how to untick things in Privacy settings so privacy is a non issue. In fact it's a lesser issue given how Microsoft doesn't allow opting out of their telemetry entirely.
 

TairikuOkami

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One of the many reasons, I no longer recommend BD Free nor Tencent, but Adaware instead. Well not like its update is fast either, but at least it works.
It looks, like the pool of viable options of free AVs is getting thinner. Like Panda cloud, it is fairly good, but unfortunately it does not update itself. :rolleyes:
 

SeriousHoax

Level 47
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Mar 16, 2019
3,630
Years ago Bitdefender Free had this weird problem where it automatically enabled file extensions, making them visible and that really annoyed me to a point I never used it because of it. Apparently Bitdefender fixed this and I've been running it on all my systems for few days now.
They haven't fixed this and won't fix this. This is related to their removal engine and happens when Bitdefender removes malwares. Pretty stupid that they can't change this behavior.
About updates, I didn't have your exact issue but it fails to update quite a lot on my system when tested both free and paid version. Then there's also that TLS 1.2 downgrade thing.
 

SeriousHoax

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Mar 16, 2019
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This is not as big of a problem as it used to be since they whitelist a lot of certificates and EV certificates. Kind of like ESET, but it’s a different list. And ESET started supporting TLS 1.3 last year.
Can you check the tls version on webpages where BD don't do MITM? I may have seen that even those were downgraded to tls 1.2 but I forgot so not fully sure.
 

blackice

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Can you check the tls version on webpages where BD don't do MITM? I may have seen that even those were downgraded to tls 1.2 but I forgot so not fully sure.
I actually uninstalled it due to a few issues I was having. However if I recall correctly it was showing TLS 1.3 for sites that used it. I am also not 100% sure.
 
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fabiobr

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One thing that I don't like about updates on AVs is that if the connection drops, when it comes back, AV doesn't check for update again even after hours being disconnected. The only who does that immediately is ESET.

My notebook sometimes I don't use it for 2-3 days like you and EVERY suite (again, except ESET that checks immediately after login) complain about not being up to date, but DOESN'T check automatically, Bitdefender stays one hour to check for updates even if it's complainning about old virus databases. Kaspersky does check for updates when you don't use the PC for 2-3 days, but only after it detects Internet connection, if you have trouble connecting to wifi immediataly after the login, Kaspersky starts to complain about old databases and only checks automatically after one hour when the auto schedule checks get triggered like Bitdefender.
 

MegenM

Level 3
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Jun 8, 2020
119
I use Bitdefender Total Security for a long time now. It does not disable itself but at times it forces me to reboot the system in order to apply the updates. I don't know if the same applies to Kaspersky or other providers.
 
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RejZoR

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Nov 26, 2016
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They haven't fixed this and won't fix this. This is related to their removal engine and happens when Bitdefender removes malwares. Pretty stupid that they can't change this behavior.
About updates, I didn't have your exact issue but it fails to update quite a lot on my system when tested both free and paid version. Then there's also that TLS 1.2 downgrade thing.

So this dumb nonsense is still around, but only happens when it detects something and makes extensions visible when it's cleaning files? Wow, that's moronic design.
 

JakeXPMan

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Oct 20, 2014
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I would go Comodo IS before Avast (the wonderous Comodo firewall)... but yeah, I can see this update problem being irritating.
 
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