Bitdefender Deleted My Archive Outlook Pst And Quarantined File Is Empty

I installed the free edition just last night to trial out if my current antivirus is missing anything. I started an On Demand scan of my C:\ drive before going to sleep. I woke up and everything was completed, except now my archive.pst file for my Outlook is missing. I cannot find it in the Quarantined Files since it's empty. It's totally gone. I can understand Bitdefender deleting the individual emails but delete my entire .pst file is unthinkable. Even worst, the Quarantined Files is empty even though it claims to have moved it there.

How do I recovery and/or restore my archive.pst file?

Why did Bitdefender delete something that is so important?

Why is there nothing in the Quarantined Files even though Bitdefender says that it's moved to Quarantined Files?

log file

no files in Quarantined Files

no pending cleanup

outlook error

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rootkit

Hello,

Please look in the same location and you will find the pst file encrypted.

For security reasons, Bitdefender Antivirus Free will not delete files. Your archive.pst will be renamed to something like archive.pst.05859.gzquar

Rename the file to archive.pst, load it in Outlook, delete all the emails from unknown contacts, empty the Spam/Junk and Tash/Delete Items folders.

Thank you!

kxn84

Thank you very much. For some reasons, I couldn't find the file initially because the folder "Documents" wasn't visible. I have renamed the archive PST file, and Outlook is able to open it. I am making a backup copy of the file.

Is there a reason why the Quarantined Files didn't show the renamed archive.pst file? It seems counter-intuitive that the log says one thing and the Quarantined Files said nothing was quarantined. I was alarmed to see that I couldn't restore something easily even though it was quarantined. Likewise, the antivirus simply commandeer the entire 671MB .pst file because of some emails in the Junk folder (I moved all of those phishing/scamming emails to Junk).

To be honest, I don't like that default behavior considering the Outlook PST files are so important to everyone who uses Outlook. And then to quarantine it without showing in the Quarantined Files window is questionable.

I would hope Bitdefender is able to look into this default behavior for the free edition. FYI: My other computers at home work very well without any issues because they didn't have Outlook PST files with malware emails. Besides this issue, I am very happy with the free edition on all my pc at home. It's far better and less intrusive than Avira. In the mean time, I will use my original antivirus since this laptop will continue to get spammed with malware emails. I can't risk getting the archive.pst file quarantine again.

unknown

In the next version there will be available a restore from quarantine option and you can exclude you .pst.

Indeed there is a problem if the quarantined items are not shown in quarantined tab.

We will investigate and come back with an answer.

unknown

Hi Khoa,

Sorry for the delay.

Does your problem still happen with the last update of the product?

You should have updated to 1039.

If the issue still occurs can you send me gzserv.log and gzlog.db?

Thanks.

azavoianu

Hello,

This issue is fixed and it will be available in the next product update

Sorry for inconvienence,

Alex

Max.Ernicke@gmx.de

Hello,

This issue is fixed and it will be available in the next product update

Sorry for inconvienence,

Alex

I have the same problem, with Bitdefender Total Security. Bitdefender deleted my PST-file. And no, the file ist NOT just renamed in the standard file. The Folder "C:\Users\xxxx\Documents\Outlook Files" is just empty!

The support escalated to second level which is not responding. What can I do to rescue my Outlook.pst file????

njoy410

Hello,

This issue is fixed and it will be available in the next product update

Sorry for inconvienence,

Alex

Apparently the problem is not fixed!

The file "Outlook.pst" was also deleted on my PC on 19 April 2014

and it seems as there is no way, to restore this file.

So ALL my Emails, as well as my adress book are lost forever.

There is neither help nor answers from BitDefinder to this major problem.

It seems as if BitDefinder has no interest to offer help or really want to solve this problem .

phil.haines

I am having the same trouble with Microsoft Outlook Express 6. I ran a scan the other day with BitDefender Antivirus Free Edition, came to check my email in the morning and all my old emails, saved emails and inbox emails had disappeared.

I have looked for various answers in the forums and tried several solutions but none seem to work, I am seriously hacked off because I had some very important emails from the previous day and now they are gone.

Sort it out BitDefender you know there is a problem, do something about it.

Baz1000

Just installed BD last week on my father's PC running W7. It has deleted his outlook.pst file with years of contacts and sub-folders. Simply stunned that BD would allow this happen.

Is there a way to retrieve it? Are there settings that can avoid this or do I need to find another security program?

Very poor BD - is there support for this issue?

Rohugh

Just installed BD last week on my father's PC running W7. It has deleted his outlook.pst file with years of contacts and sub-folders. Simply stunned that BD would allow this happen.

Is there a way to retrieve it? Are there settings that can avoid this or do I need to find another security program?

Hello Baz,

Have you seen post #2 where Christian advises where it went to and how to get it back?

Please look in the same location and you will find the pst file encrypted.

For security reasons, Bitdefender Antivirus Free will not delete files. Your archive.pst will be renamed to something like archive.pst.05859.gzquar

Rename the file to archive.pst, load it in Outlook, delete all the emails from unknown contacts, empty the Spam/Junk and Tash/Delete Items folders.

7upcmp99

I have the same problem, with Bitdefender Total Security. Bitdefender deleted my PST-file. And no, the file ist NOT just renamed in the standard file. The Folder "C:\Users\xxxx\Documents\Outlook Files" is just empty!

The support escalated to second level which is not responding. What can I do to rescue my Outlook.pst file????

This just happened to me also. Last evening I did a scan and it found a virus in my outlook archives and asked what action to take. I chose the option to quarantine the outlook file with the attachment. Then this morning I couldn't open Outlook because it couldn't find the Outlook.pst file. ALL my emails for the last several years are GONE! Is there really no way to recover them?? This is not acceptable!

AdrianHa

The files should be renamed and archived within the normal Outlook locaion.

The location depends on your OS. http://office.microsoft.com/en-001/outlook...A103412630.aspx

The other choice would be to remove Bitdefender from Start Up and run system restore.

Baz1000

Hello Baz,

Have you seen post #2 where Christian advises where it went to and how to get it back?

Thanks Rohugh, yes I've successfully restored his Outlook functionality. But it doesn't really solve the problem - the reason I'm trialling BD is the fact that it checks his Outlook emails for issues, but if I need to ignore the issues when it finds them (to save Outook from being deleted) then is there much point in using BD? I'd like to be able to accept BD's action recommendations knowing that the outlook.pst file will not be deleted!

Max.Ernicke@gmx.de

Thanks Rohugh, yes I've successfully restored his Outlook functionality. But it doesn't really solve the problem - the reason I'm trialling BD is the fact that it checks his Outlook emails for issues, but if I need to ignore the issues when it finds them (to save Outook from being deleted) then is there much point in using BD? I'd like to be able to accept BD's action recommendations knowing that the outlook.pst file will not be deleted!

Congrats to you. It didn't help me. Everything is lost. And the support did not provide any reasonable solution for 5 weeks. So I gave up. Cost me a huge amount of time to restore everything from old back up files. Its also unbelievable that this and alle the other threads regarding this problem are simply ignored by Bitdefener...

The worst service I have EVER experienced.

bcos

I have the same problem. A freelance technician just visited and he couldn't find the appropriate *pst files either. Have you now got advice further to that above which may help me retrieve them from quarantine?

NerdsOfTech

Date: 8/8/2020

I helped my client install the latest BitDefender Antivirus Plus.

After a Full System Scan, BitDefender quarantined the client's .pst file on the c: drive and backup drives.

This caused Outlook to stop working.

I helped the client restore the .pst files from quarantine by doing these steps:

Open BitDefender

Click Protection (left panel).

In Antivirus section, click Open (link).

Click Settings (link).

In the Quarantined threats section, click Manage Quarantine (link).

Click View Settings (link)

For the Create exception for restored files open, toggle to enabled [blue], if not already enabled.

Close the Quarantine Settings window by clicking the x.

Check-mark the quarantined pst file, then click the Restore (button).

After the .pst file was restored, Outlook was not able to open the data file. This process also made an exception for the .pst for future virus scans.

Next, I ran Oulook's PST repair tool (scanpst.exe) on the .pst file. This tool is located at (for Office 365):

C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\

After repairing the .pst, Outlook worked again.

Mission accomplished!

Hopefully this helps anyone in the same predicament.

Telesto

Hi,

I lost all of my Outlook 2019 folders, emails etc. Nothing on display when Outlook was opened and no warning or notice that something had been the reason for the disappearance!

It took 5 weeks of searching for the missing pst file only to discover that it was in BitDefender Quarantine!!!! Once restored, all folders and emails were back in Outlook.

Hope this helps others with similar issues.

WHY DIDN'T BITDEFENDER POP UP A NOTICE THAT SUCH AN IMPORTANT PROGRAMME WAS AFFECTED?????

BITDEFENDER PLEASE POP UP A DIALOGUE BOX CONTAINING A LIST OF QUARANTINES AND ACTIONS