Panda Antivirus Accidentally Identifies Itself & Essential Windows Components As Malicious

Spanish security software makers, Panda Antivirus found itself in a precarious situation when a bad update for its antivirus products identified some of its own components and several essential Windows files as malicious and quarantined them causing problems for many users worldwide. The problem started on 11th March when Panda Antivirus released a regular update for Panda Cloud Office Protection and Retail 2015 customers that contained a signature file that identified several components of its own software as malicious. Several users on Reddit reported that the signature file allegedly identified Microsoft Office, Chrome, Firefox and Windows Updates files as threats and quarantined them too. The users who had installed this update reported their systems to be functioning abnormally and a few of them even said that their Windows PCs needed reformatting.


Panda Antivirus quickly responded to these reports and released an advisory to all the affected users asking them not to restart their computers as it may brick them. It later removed the erroneous signature file from all its servers and issued a fresh update that rectified this issue. Users whose system files were locked in the quarantine box were asked to download a free tool from the website that restored all the important files in their original locations. Users who were unable to boot their PCs were asked to initiate the safe mode boot of Windows PCs and run the aforementioned tool. People who had any other issues were asked to contact customer support. Panda Antivirus said that only 8% of its users were affected due to this issue and they have received no reports of data loss from their customers.

You can read more about this development Panda Cloud AV just took a shit on us : sysadmin that first reported this issue and refer to the official Panda Antivirus announcements #-Link-Snipped-# and #-Link-Snipped-#.

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