Microsoft Safety Scanner says it is finding infected files while running but when finished says no viruses or spyware found!

Anonymous
2025-06-29T12:45:46+00:00

I ran the Microsoft Safety Scanner yesterday and ran a full scan. It took all day to run. While still running and before I went to bed it showed over 3800 infected files. It said that a report would be available when finished as to what if found. However, when I checked this morning after it had completed its scan it says:

The scan completed successfully, and no viruses, spyware, and other potentially unwanted software were detected.

If that is the case, why was it showing over 3800 infected files while running?

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Security and privacy

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quietman7 MVP Alumni 19,830 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2025-06-29T14:20:35+00:00

If the Microsoft Safety Scanner (MSERT) found a number of infected files during the scan but the final scan results indicate no malware was detected...this is normal behavior by many Microsoft Animalware Software but not very well documented by the Microsoft Security Team. It is not unusual for Defender (or other security software) to suspect and warn about possible threats during a scan (a preliminary status indication) but later determine the file(s) were not an actual confirmed threat(s) upon completion. 
 
I explain this behavior in more detail in Microsoft Security products indicates detected files during scan but does not show anything after completion (Post #22).

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DaveM121 928.6K Reputation points Independent Advisor
2025-06-29T13:18:59+00:00

Hi, I am Dave, I will help you with this.

The Microsoft Safety Scanner works in a different way to other anti-virus software, during the scan it marks files that may be infected, and at the end of the scan, it tests them against the malware database, if at the end of the scan it is indicated no problems were found, then your system is malware free.

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