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How to report a virus-scan false-positive?

  • 2 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 6 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

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Half a year ago, I've tried to download a specific ".exe" file (from here: http://www.emptyloop.com/unlocker/). It was indicated as a potential threat. Of course, I've found a workaround, and thought that this is some kind of a temporary issue.

Today, the same file is still blocked: firefox says "Blocked: May contain a virus or spyware ...", chrome also says "This file is malicious". I still believe that this is a false-positive. VirusTotal shows 2/55 ( https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b3284358029388637e642077f99e81e81144d8dab2f2623e263dbb5b625be746/analysis/ ).

I've looked through

And I feel like I understood the basics. The question is - are there any ways to report this false positive, so that it would be fixed? Either firefox-specific, or GoogleSafeBrowsing-wide? Any positive experience, "success-stories"? Currently, I've found the following ideas:

  • Report via Google webmaster tools - probably won't work, since it's not my site.
  • Try to contact those 2 of 55 AntiVirus companies, and ask them to fix those signatures - maybe after that it would get removed automatically?
Half a year ago, I've tried to download a specific ".exe" file (from here: http://www.emptyloop.com/unlocker/). It was indicated as a potential threat. Of course, I've found a workaround, and thought that this is some kind of a temporary issue. Today, the same file is still blocked: firefox says "Blocked: May contain a virus or spyware ...", chrome also says "This file is malicious". I still believe that this is a false-positive. VirusTotal shows 2/55 ( https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b3284358029388637e642077f99e81e81144d8dab2f2623e263dbb5b625be746/analysis/ ). I've looked through * "False positive on docx from facebook" ( https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1048742 ), * "How does built-in Phishing and Malware Protection work?" ( https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-does-phishing-and-malware-protection-work ) * "How to prevent Firefox from blocking my software download if Google Safe Browsing simply doesn't respond to false positive reports in Web Master Tools?" ( https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1054121 ) And I feel like I understood the basics. The question is - are there any ways to report this false positive, so that it would be fixed? Either firefox-specific, or GoogleSafeBrowsing-wide? Any positive experience, "success-stories"? Currently, I've found the following ideas: * Report via Google webmaster tools - probably won't work, since it's not my site. * Try to contact those 2 of 55 AntiVirus companies, and ask them to fix those signatures - maybe after that it would get removed automatically?

All Replies (2)

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Google has an option for web site owners:

I have not found another place either.

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Blocking a download via this service is not about a problem with a specific file, but generally about the origin (domain) where this file is hosted. If there has ever been malware hosted on the specific URL and Google has detected it then this URL will be black listed and all files will be affected. It is all files safe or no files safe (i.e. all are dangerous).