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Hi - In the last week or so we have noticed that Webroot has started downloading files we have in SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business to scan them. These files are actually cloud-only files that appear in the File Explorer but actually aren’t on the machine, When a user opens the file it is seamlessly downloaded to the machine. See https://support.office.com/en-us/article/save-disk-space-with-onedrive-files-on-demand-for-windows-10-0e6860d3-d9f3-4971-b321-7092438fb38e

 

Webroot is causing random files to be ‘hydrated’ as if the user had opened the file, this is consuming bandwidth and local storage on devices. Windows has the option to block the app from doing this called Automatic Files Downloaded, see https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/101977-allow-block-automatic-file-downloads-apps-windows-10-a.html

 

I can block Webroot on my machine and it works, but I would prefer if Webroot would detect files are online-online and not download/hydrate the files to scan them, it should just skip them by reading the file attributes.

 

Thanks

Trent.

Looks like Webroot is following ‘links’ to scan them - is it doing that for links to files on the Network too? That would be a big performance hit.

Hi - we don’t have any network paths for files, everything is in SharePoint Online and accessed by OneDrive Files On Demand. Same as Dropbox Smart Sync - https://help.dropbox.com/installs-integrations/sync-uploads/smart-sync

Hi - In the last week or so we have noticed that Webroot has started downloading files we have in SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business to scan them. These files are actually cloud-only files that appear in the File Explorer but actually aren’t on the machine, When a user opens the file it is seamlessly downloaded to the machine. See https://support.office.com/en-us/article/save-disk-space-with-onedrive-files-on-demand-for-windows-10-0e6860d3-d9f3-4971-b321-7092438fb38e

 

Webroot is causing random files to be ‘hydrated’ as if the user had opened the file, this is consuming bandwidth and local storage on devices. Windows has the option to block the app from doing this called Automatic Files Downloaded, see https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/101977-allow-block-automatic-file-downloads-apps-windows-10-a.html

 

I can block Webroot on my machine and it works, but I would prefer if Webroot would detect files are online-online and not download/hydrate the files to scan them, it should just skip them by reading the file attributes.

 

Thanks

Trent.

Hey Trent,

Have you tried contacting our support team about this? If it’s very disruptive to your workflow, I would recommend filing a support ticket here: https://www.webroot.com/us/en/support/home-contact

After you get in contact with them, please report back what your findings are! And if you need any help escalating your case, please send me a private message.

 

Thanks!

-Keenan

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