Threat not cleaned

Sophos Endpoint Security and Control

Threat not cleaned

If Sophos Anti-Virus has not cleaned a threat from your computer, it may be because of the following.

Automatic cleanup is disabled

If Sophos Anti-Virus has not attempted cleanup, check that automatic cleanup has been enabled. For information on enabling automatic cleanup, see the following topics:

Automatic cleanup of adware and PUAs is not available for on-access scanning.

Cleanup failed

If Sophos Anti-Virus could not clean a threat ("Cleanup failed"), it may be that it cannot clean that type of threat, or you have insufficient access rights.

Full computer scan is required

You may need to run a full computer scan to determine all components of a multi-component threat, or to detect a threat in files that were previously hidden, before Sophos Anti-Virus can clean it from your computer.

  1. To scan all disk drives, including boot sectors, on the computer, run the Scan my computer scan. For information, see Run a full computer scan.
  2. If the threat has still not been fully detected, it may be because you have insufficient access rights, or some drives or folders on the computer, containing the threat’s components, are excluded from scanning. For information, see Add, edit, or delete on-access scanning exclusions. Check the list of the items excluded from scanning. If there are some items on the list, remove them from the list and scan your computer again.

Removable medium is write-protected

If dealing with a removable medium (e.g. floppy disk, CD), make sure that it is not write-protected.

NTFS volume is write-protected

If dealing with files on an NTFS volume (Windows XP or later), make sure that it is not write-protected.

Virus/spyware fragment has been reported

Sophos Anti-Virus does not clean a virus/spyware fragment because it has not found an exact virus/spyware match. Refer to Virus/spyware fragment reported.