With regard to the new Bitdefender interface on MacOS, how can you tell when definition updates are successfully downloaded?

Question

On the prior interface, the activity "overview" showed when updates were installed. Can we expect the same functionality in this new interface? Or somewhere else? I have been running 36 hours with no visible definition updates yet, but I allow for the possibility of this being silent in the background.

Would still be nice to have a sense that these updates were being downloaded and applied.

And some additional questions….

During the update to the new version, I was not asked to provide Full Disk Access to this new program. In opening up my security options, I see that Core Security, SecurityService, and Bitdefender.SPSE still have full disk access, but bdagentd does not have it active (although I recall it didn't show it as active even in the old version and it did seem to have access anyway)

I also note if I try to do a "custom scan", I can select folders, but not specific files… they are all greyed out.

The icon on MacOS in the upper right corner of my screen seems to change color from white to dark without clear reason why.

I know there are always growing pains with new versions, but wanted to bring these questions and unexpected behaviors to your attention.

Alexandru_BD · Answer

Thank you and yes, this has been taken into consideration.

I appreciate your open feedback once again.

sleepdoc · Answer

As per usual, @Alexandru_BD for the win.

Thanks for all of your responses.

FWIW, I have not seen any of these notifications, even though I turned off the "silent update" toggle. Especially given my issues with the prior product not receiving regular updates, I think this is a critical functionality, either by showing the timing of updates, or by allowing the user to see the "version number" of the definitions (not the product) to compare against an online standard. This is a functionality I have seen in every other antivirus / anti-malware product, and it is one that gives the end-user confidence that they are protected. IMHO, this is a necessity, not an optional feature.

Alexandru_BD · Answer

Hello,

With the new Bitdefender UI for macOS, the update is done automatically in the background. A notification is displayed when an update starts but it's auto-dismissible. The product developers will consider your suggestion to display more details about  updates, as a future improvement.

Regarding the Full Disk Access, the permissions for the processes were preserved in the new application, as the OS already has them saved as accepted (bdagent does not need FDA btw).

As for the custom scan, there's indeed a limitation from the new UI, however the developers plan to add support for file scanning as well.

Regarding the icon, that's a known bug that will be fixed in the next updates.

Your feedback is highly appreciated, thank you very much for posting here.

Regards