How Do I Contact MS Support for Windows DEFENDER?

Hi Barry,

My name is Igor, I have 12 Microsoft MVP awards. It's a pleasure for me to help others and I'll do all my best to help you. I'm sorry you have a problems.

It is sad but Microsoft closed incoming phone lines. Free support is available thru link you've mentioned but one need some luck to use it.

One may try paid support for business, https://support.serviceshub.microsoft.com/suppo...

May be someone be able to help you in this forum. Please create new topic and describe your problem in details.

Please note, License Agreement says: Microsoft provides limited support services for properly licensed software as described at https://support.microsoft.com/

Another quick reply on my problem. I did use chat this afternoon and was connected to a support person. She did little except connect to my machine (with my permission), look around, and run Windows Update to install the monthly MRT checker and the December Cumulative Windows 10 21H2 update. Fro0m the chat log:

December 22, 2021, 4:07 pmNatalia
Thank you so much for all your time and patience, Barry! After the update it should work, it will take just a couple of minutes.

December 22, 2021, 4:15 pmNatalia
"... it should work" - What should work?

December 22, 2021, 4:16 pmBarry S.
I mean Windows defender.

She seems to be implying that the December cumulative patch WOULD resolve my problem, but without any statement from MS that they know of my problem and have issued a fix that is contained in the cumulative patch, I do not believe what she wrote. I am a person who dislikes "try the latest patch/beta; it MIGHT resolve your problem".

She then transferred me to a specialist, who responded three hours later when I was no longer at my computer.

What is the file C:\WINDOWS\system32\SRU\SRUDB.dat ? That file on my disk has a very current timestamp. I looked at one web site, and did not understand what it was telling me. I do not want to delete it or rename it without knowing more details.

As for EventID 10016 - I normally do not look at the EventLog because it is filled with (to me) meaningless entries like this one.

As for the 1002 EventID, there is NOTHING MORE in that log entry. It appears that that log entry was generated by Defender itself, which leads me to believe that the error message I saw in the pop-up window (the same message as in the EventLog entry), was written by Defender and not by some process that was monitoring Defender. I do not want to sound abusive/snarky here, but I am an IT professional who wrote his first computer program (FORTRAN II) in 1966. I do not know how anyone with any computer software development skills could write such an error message that is devoid of any diagnostic information. That is why I suggested that access to the source code would be necessary to determine in which case(s) Defender issues this message and terminates the scan. And, without access to the code, I have no idea if this message is issued in one specific case or if it is generic for multiple error cases. Another pet peeve - an error message should NEVER state, "either A or B occurred", letting the end user try to determine which case occurred.

@Barry S. Finkel

Event viewer should shed some light in the logs.

Try doing this first though

• Microsoft Safety Scanner

Phase 1. Attempt a Quick Scan to make sure there are no immediate threats. If there are issues let us know.

Then attempt a full scan. If there are issues let us know.

Phase 2. Attempt a Quick scan with Windows Defender. Does it go through or get interrupted?

Power Settings

When you return to the computer during / after scan did the computer at some point wake up from sleep or hibernate?

This will not necessarily fix your problem but could always be of help.

When things are acting weird this can never hurt, usually, other than cost a bit of time.

• Run **CMD.**exe as Administrator
• Enter sfc /scannow
• Common Outcomes
  • Windows did not find any integrity violations
  • Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files and repaired them
  • Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files but was unable to fix some (or all) of them
• Enter DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Then do a reboot and see if anything happens. Maybe something else completely unrelated got corrupted at some point. Good health check either way.

BING IT to see more info about these commands.

sfc /scannow

DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Igor, thanks for the response. It appears that MS is only interested in paying business customers, not the average person who has purchased Windows 10. I have posted my problem on MS fora, and no one has the answer. I assume that the only persons who can solve my problem are those who have access to the Defender source code. And I assume that none of those persons monitors these fora. I have seen many "answers" to problems on online fora where the respondent seems to be "shooting in the dark" with possible solutions.

Here is my problem. I run a Defender full scan once a week in my Windows 10 64-bit 21H2 system. Sometimes I get a message that the defender scan has terminated before completion. There are no other details. Either 1) Defender is terminating for some unknown reason and not giving details, or 2) some Windows 10 process is monitoring Defender and notices that the Defender scan has terminated abnormally. I have no idea which of these two is happening. In any case, when I run the full scan the next evening the scan runs to its 8-hour completion. Why is the Defender full scan terminating? As I wrote above, I doubt that any MVP who does not have access to the Defender source code will have a definitive answer to my problem/question.