"App blocked for your protection" on boot. How to find which app?

Frustrating one. Win 10 is telling me on boot that one of my apps is being blocked. But, the dialog box does not provide any information whatsoever on which app it is. The only buttons on the dialog are "Copy to clipboard" (only copies the message text, no additional information) and "Close."

This happens on every boot. And, about once an hour I get another one, still with no info. I have no idea if that's the same app or different ones.

Is there a log somewhere that will tell me which app is blocked?

I realize I can disable stuff until I find the program in question. But, I'm not really in the mood to sit here and watch this thing boot over and over.

I have looked in Event Viewer. But, there's no way to search across all the folders. I have to individually open each folder and sub-folder and group of events. There are at least 50 in the Windows folder, alone. That would be as tedious as a bunch of reboots. I have searched a few near the top level that look like they might apply. Only one hit on the word "blocked" in the System events. It said it's blocking the BranchCache service. I don't think that's associated with a particular app. So, I don't think that's the culprit.

Possibly connected: This started happening when I uninstalled Avast and installed Avira. So, it could have something to do with that. And/or, I also followed the steps at wikihow to disable Avira's upgrade nags.

Also, immediately after installing Avira, Windows told me that it had an update ready, which I installed. So, that might be the cause, or involved in some way.

Suggestions appreciated,

Drake Christensen

This started happening when I uninstalled Avast and installed Avira.

https://answers.avira.com/en/questions


Did you use the Avast uninstall tool ? May want to check the registry for remnants of Avast.

Also, check the above forum link.

You should have received a notification like below which identifies the app. Pls post a screenshot of the notification.

Yes. I downloaded the tool, booted to Safe Mode and ran it. Rebooted, then installed Avira.

The dialog does not look like that, at all. If it were, obviously I'd have plenty of info.

I'll try to grab a screenshot next time it happens. Worst case, I'll use my phone to take a picture.

You may also want to run a scan with Malwarebytes Free, ESET online scan, or another AV.

Also, AdwCleaner. https://www.malwarebytes.com/adwcleaner/

Do some "googling" on Windows SmartScreen which normally prevents apps from running.

And, as I said, "Copy to clipboard" just copies that dialog text.

Yeah, in my searches for "This app has been blocked by your system" I saw a lot talking about SmartScreen. But, a quick skim of some of the summaries made it look like more of, "I tried to run this app and I'm told I'm blocked" type questions. I wasn't able to come up with a search phrase that filtered those out. I couldn't find anything that addressed my situation.

Have you asked in the Avira forum ?

No, I haven't. My impression thus far is that that is coincidence.

But, I suppose that's worth a try. Thanks for the suggestion