nukecad

Breachguard is not an antivirus, so it should not clash with your Norton (or with any other antivirus/antimalware app). Breachguard is not interested in viruses/malware at all. What Breachguard does is check the web to see if any of your email address(es) has, or may have, been collected in a data breach and then turn up in a list anywhere on the web. It just warns you about it if they do turn up on such a list. How useful you might find such a warning, or not, is for you to decide. Here's a review of breachguard from 2020: https://uk.pcmag.com/encryption/127704/avast-breachguard

No Custom Clean is still working as it always has. Can you give more details of why you say that it is not working for you (but Health Check is). Is Custom Clean not starting at all? Or is it starting and then getting stuck? Or is it completing but not cleaning what you think it should be? If it's getting stuck that what does it say at the top of the results window when stuck? eg:

We only had a few reports of the MOVEit email, and the free offer of Breachguard for six months. Be aware that I believe the offer is for a free subscription to Breachguard, so if you keep it beyond the initial six months then it may automatically renew and charge you to keep using it. I'm not 100% sure of that, but you may want to double check if an automatic subscription renewal/charge has been set up for Breachguard. For some more details about the CCleaner emails, and advice about what to do if you have been affected in any data breach, see the thread here:

If Irfanview can't display them then personally I'd regard them as unrecoverable. The fact that you also used a paid for tool with no success would tend to confirm that. I believe that 'Excellent' in Recuva just means that it has found the correct number of bytes to be recovered, so there is an 'excellent' chance of recovering whatever those bytes contain. But it can't know if those bytes contain the 'right' data or not; the only way to find that out is by recovering the file and then trying to open it.

Just a thought, are you using the current "Standard" installer. If the installer that you are using asks you to tick a box to "Run CCleaner" at the end of the install then it is not the current Standard installer and it may ask you to do that.

You get CCleaner for Android through the Google Play Store, and then use your existing licence key to activate it - if your key is valid for multiple devices. It needs to be a 20 character CCleaner Pro Plus, or CCleaner Premium key to be valid for multiple devices. Note that the older, 24 character, Pro Plus keys were for 3 PCs and not 3 devices, it's a subtle difference. If you still have an older, 24 character, Pro Plus key then you will need to get updated to a newer, 20 character, key so that 20 character key can be used to activate CCleaner Android. If that is the case then see this post for how to get updated:

Those multiple Visual C++ installs are normal, you should also have others from different years. They are put there by Windows itself, and by other software when you install it. Removing some may be possible, but removing any one of them may cause parts of Windows or other installed apps to stop working. They don't take much room or resources so it's best just to leave them all there. For more info about them see: https://www.howtogeek.com/256245/why-are-there-so-many-microsoft-visual-c-redistributables-installed-on-my-pc/

Thanks for reporting back that it has now (eventually) been resolved to your satisfaction.

Sorry, but no. Like I said we are aware that support is taking much longer than they used to take, but you are in the queue and just have to wait for it to be your turn. Think about it - If there was a way that someone could jump the queue then that would mean someone else gets pushed back and has to wait even longer. You wouldn't like it if others could somehow jump in front of your request so that you had to wait longer.

For licensing issues you will need to make a request to support. You can use the form here to raise your request: https://support.ccleaner.com/s/contact-form?language=en_US&form=general Please be aware that support are very busy at the moment and are taking much longer that usual to answer. (Up to a week, or even longer).

You can do everything with the free version that you can with the pro version - except for some advanced stuff with virtual hard drives (which very few people use anyway). Are you having a particular problem with using Recuva that we may be able to help you with?

Defraggler no longer has a pro version - there is just one free version that does all that Pro ever did. (That's why Defraggler is no longer mentioned in Pro Plus). Speccy and Recuva still do have Pro versions - but functionally the free versions are the same and Pro just gives priority support if you want/need it. The main difference at the moment between CCleaner Pro, CCleaner Pro Plus. & CCleaner Premium is the number of devices each gives you a licence for. Premium also comes with Kamo included, and with extra 24/7 support. To be frank I would weigh up how many devices you want to licence CCleaner on. and use Speccy and Recuva free versions (and Defraggler) as you like.

Using havibeenpwned is a good way to check if you email, or passwords, have been stolen in a data breach and shared - either from this breach of from one of the many, many, other data breaches that do happen. It's free to check at anytime that you want to check, here are the haveIbeenpwned links again: https://haveibeenpwned.com/ https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords If it's your password(s) that has been pwned - those are easily changed to prevent anyone using it to login to your accounts. With a pwned email address then it's more a case of your knowing that it's now out there in public - so you may get more spam sent to it, and more sent to it begging for money or scams attempting to con you into something. If you are going to be keeping that email address - because you don't have to abandon a pwned email address, But you do have to be more careful of anything you receive at that address - you should always be being careful anyway. The other problem that you might face with a pwned email is someone pretending to be you to people on your contacts list by faking emails as being from you. Of course to do that they also have to have had access to your contacts list at some time. Whilst it does happen it's not common, because they would have to have both your email address and your contacts list. If you are keeping an email that you know has been pwned then you may want to inform your contacts who have that email address, so that they can be careful of any emails supposedly coming from it which might not be from you but may be fakes. In the end having your email address pwned in a data breach is not that different from you yourself putting your email in open view where anyone can see it. (Which is why we edit them out of forum posts when we see someone do that). You can even think of it as being similar to your postal (snail mail) address being put on mailing lists and shared, so that you get more advertising letters and 'please support/donate to ....' letters and leaflets sent to it through the post. Whilst we all accept that that happens with our postal addresses, we like it less when it happens with email addresses, simply because we tend to think of emails as being more private. The answer in both cases is of course to spot which is the junk mail, ignore it and throw it away. (Or change your address- that's much easier to do with an email address than moving house would be).

The free offer is for those who have had the MOVEit breach email from CCleaner - if that includes you then you will get a further email about getiing/installing the offer. The free offer is not just for anyone who happens to have been pwned in some other, unrelated, breach. Note that Avast BreachGuard will not prevent you being pwned in a data breach, nothing you can install on your devices could do that. What it does is check the web to tell you if your details subsequently appear of a list after you have been pwned. In other words it can only tell you after it's already happened. TBH I don't need something to tell me that, Data Breaches are a fact of life these days and so I just assume that it has happened to some of my data at sometime, act accordingly, and check havibeenpwned regularly. You have now checked and found that some of yours has been breached 3 different times now, and no doubt will be again at sometime. When (not if) you find something of yours has been pwned then you change it or abandon it and move on. If it's an email address and you can't abandon it, or don't want to, then you be careful about what you recieve there because you know that it has been involved in a breach so some spammer/scammer/con artist may now have got hold of it.

I'm not sure if this is the case here but: Companies are often obliged by other legislations to retain such financial data, and where that is the case that financial legislation takes precedence and they are not allowed to delete it even if/when the customer request removal. The "right of removal" of data is often misunderstood, it is not an absolute right and there are exceptions. See this from the UK regulator, in particular the section - "When can the organisation say no?". https://ico.org.uk/for-the-public/your-right-to-get-your-data-deleted/ Obviously in different countries (and in the USA different states) different data protection rules apply.

Open your CCleaner and go to Options>License Key. It will tell you there your CCleaner licence expiry date, and also whether the auto renewal is Enabled or Disabled.

In that case I'd assume that the SSD has almost certainly been TRIM'ed, and the data is no longer recoverable. Sorry, but it's something that we see more often these days as more people have SSDs in their computers. It's one reason nowadays why it is more important that ever to have your files backed up to an external drive, or in the cloud. Having 2 or even 3 backups, to different drives kept in different places, is a good idea to keep your data even safer from accidental loss. However I would be interested in knowing just what you are meaning when you say that you have a "shadow copy"? Do you mean a Windows Restore point? If not a Windows Restore Point then what software was used to create that 'shadow copy'? Is it saved on your internal drive?, an external drive?, or in the cloud? Here is a bit more of an explanation of why deleted data cannot be recovered after an SSD TRIM:

Just to note that I believe that the free Avast BreachGuard will be on a automatic subscription basis. If I am right about that then you can think of it as a special '6 month free trial' for those who have been affected - and you will need to cancel the automatic subscription at (or before) 6 months if you don't want to keep it and automatically pay for it.

@Montezuma No, this has nothing to do with the 2017 hack of CCleaner. This is a new, 2023, 'data breach' (not a 'hack' although that word is often used in the media to cover lots of different things). This is a new'ish data theft involving the 'MOVEit Transfer' software that is used by many large organisations and companies. Many of those large organisations and companies were affected by it to a lesser or greater extent. I've been looking at the timeline and from what I can find so far: The company that owns the 'MOVEit' software first reported finding the vulnerability in their system at the end of May/beginging of June 2023. Steps were taken to close down the vulnerabulity. The company that owns CCleaner (Gen Digital) reported at the end of June 2023 that they had been affected, and they (may have) had data stolen. At that time it was thought that only employee data had been taken, and that no customer data had been accessed. More checking has been done and CCleaner is now informing some users, by email, that their data may have been breached/stolen. We haven't been told just how many CCleaner users have been sent these emails, or if any more will be sent out. NOTE that this is not an infection, it is not something that is 'on your machine' at all. But do run a scan with Windows Security/Windows Defender, or any other antivirus/antimalware app you have, if you want to reassure yourself of that. What has happened is that some of your details, such as your email address, may have been stolen, and so may now be shared by spammers, scammers, con artists, and other bad guys. This means that you should be extra careful/wary of any emails that may now be sent to that email address, and should check carefully any that you are not sure about. TBH you should already always be being careful about all emails that you get anyway. Using havibeenpwned is a good way to check if you email (or passwords) have been stolen and shared in that way - either from this breach of from one of the many, many, other data breaches that do happen. It's free to check them at anytime that you want to check, here are the haveIbeenpwned links again: https://haveibeenpwned.com/ https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords Those who do get an email from CCleaner are being offered Avast BreachGuard for 6 months for free, once set up that will automatically keep checking the web to see if your email etc, turns up on any lists.

Is the drive a HDD or an SSD? If it is a SSD then it will almost certainly have been automatically TRIM'ed - either straight following the deletion, or sometime since. Once an SSD TRIM has been carried out then any previously deleted data will no longer be recoverable.

@rogerlmartin Good to hear that you got it sorted out. @DaveJustDave thanks for confirming my suspicion about the older 24 character keys not working to activate CCleaner Android, so that you need to change it to a 20 character key to be able to do that.

Good to hear that it has been sorted out for you now. Not so good to hear how long it has taken.

Yes this is genuine. But you are right to double check if not sure. (PS. the CCleaner support is based in the Phillipines). It is good that haveIbeenpwned shows you as clear, but you may want to check again in a week or so. (I check my emails and passwords there at least once a month). Please see the post above from Gayathri CCleaner.

@crizal Thanks for the update that Edge is messing about yet again. I don't normally use it myself, - unless I have to because some website is being funny with Firefox.

A fairly recent Edge update appears to have messed up or lost the settings that relate to background running. (Possibly deliberately ?) The solution others have found works for them is to toggle the settings off and then back on again.