New: March 25, 2021

Configure Global Exclusions

Global exclusions are a list of processes, files, folders and network traffic that you instruct AV Defender to ignore while performing security scans. These are the items you know are safe so AV Defender can skip them, speeding up the scanning process. For example, applications like our Windows probe (wsp.exe) can be flagged as a virus because they do network scanning, which could be interpreted as a virus looking for a vulnerability, or PST or OST files.

Windows 10 offers an optional case-sensitive file system. How the Windows device is configured can affect how you enter the search criteria in the search field on the Global Exclusions page.

For the best results, use the exclusion that accomplishes specific goals. For example:

  • Process: Used to resolve application conflicts, performance issues, and reduce impact on key business applications.
  • File/Folder: Used to avoid false positive errors or for heavy traffic folders, such as backup destinations.
  • Network: Used to exclude a web site from being scanned. Exclusions will apply to all modules.

Wildcards

You can use two wildcards in exclusions:

  • The asterisk (*) as a substitute for zero or more characters.

  • The question mark (?) substitutes for a single character. Use multiple question marks to define a specific number of characters. For example, ??? substitutes exactly three characters.

File exclusions:

  • C:\Documents\* – excludes all files from Documents folder

  • C:\Documents\*.png – excludes all PNG files, from the Documents folder

Folder exclusion:

  • C:\Documents\* - excludes all folders from Documents folder

Process exclusion:

  • C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Microsoft.Not??.exe – excludes the Microsoft Notes processes.

For more information, see Global Exclusions.

  1. Click Configuration > Security Manager > Global Exclusions.
  2. Click the tab for the type of exclusion you want to add.
  3. Click Add and enter configuration information.
    • For a process, type the full process path; for example, C:\Program Files (x86)\N-able Technologies\Windows Software Probe\bin\wsp.exe.
    • For a file or folder, type the location of the file or folder; for example, C:\documents.
    • For a network scan, type the IP, URL, or application; for example, www.tmz.com.
  4. Click Save.

After you configure Global exclusions, select a Security Manager profile.

N-able N-central has a maximum of 1024 non-duplicate file/folder exclusions. This includes process or network exclusions and includes hard-coded Bitdefender exclusions which are typically less than ten.

If a warning appears, then the number of configured exclusions may be approaching this limit. Any exclusion beyond the 1024 exclusions are ignored.

Best practices

  • Configure important exclusions earlier in the list.
  • Use Process exclusions
  • Use File/Folder exclusions sparingly. Only use File/Folder exclusions where the scanning itself is causing issues, or if removal from the files can be damaging.
  • Reduce the number of File/Folder exclusions by restricting exclusions to folders or file extensions.

You can view the configured exclusions for a device at C:\Program Files\N-able Technologies\AVDefender\settings\system\FileScan.OnAccess.