Invalid firewall rules

[mhhack]

I'm running Win 10 64bit Pro, and Ccleaner is finding 500 + invalid firewall entries when running registry cleaner. When I uncheck the obsolete software box CC finds no entries. If I delete these entries all seems okay, but a few days later all these deleted invalid firewall entries reappear. Somehow, whatever is producing these entries still remains on my computer. I'm running  Windows Defender, Malwarebytes and Glasswire.

Any ideas?

[mta]

G'day and welcome to the forums,

playing with the registry for purely cleaning purposes is unnecessary from a performance angle and potentially damaging.

if those firewall entries are causing errors, blue screens, or problems, yep, try to fix them but the fact they are reappearing means some installed program thinks they are required. (maybe your AV software).

official MS response here; https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2563254/microsoft-support-policy-for-the-use-of-registry-cleaning-utilities

[mhhack]

MS seems nto feel that registry cleaners are unnecessary, as you do. These entries on my PC don't seem to be causing any of the problems you've mentioned. I've checked for unnecessary programs and deleted them. Aside from using Ccleaner and Revo Uninstaller, do you know of any other ways to delete unused software?

I wonder therefore why Ccleaner gives such prominence to its registry cleaner. It's all a bit confusing.

[Andavari]

The registry cleaner may work good with still supported older OSes such as Windows XP, but with Windows 10 there's allot more to break, and you're really entering unknown territory using or even trusting any registry cleaner not just the one in CCleaner. Since Windows 10 is a constantly evolving OS it's best to refrain from cleaning its registry.

Registry cleaner's depending upon how aggressive they are can produce false positives - that's where they become damaging. The truth is they're only useful if people have the patience to manually investigate each and every entry they deem as invalid because if that's not done there's the potential of breaking something.

I personally will not run a registry cleaner on Windows 10 not even CCleaner's and even though it's considered as being non-aggressive it can produce a false positive. Also if you look at security software such as Malwarebytes when scanning it will flag some registry cleaners as potential malware or unwanted software (even if they're not actually infected).

[mta]

just for clarification, those errors I mention were purely to use as examples and in no way was I implying that they were your issues.

as you say, those entries don't seem to be causing any errors, so why touch them?

I stopped being registry inquisitive years ago after doing the same thing... going through, removing whatever CC told me to.
but the issue with hacking the registry is it rarely gets noticed straight away.  It may be weeks or months down the track that 'unexplained' things start presenting themselves.

But, with the P in PC standing for personal, we each play with ours as we deem fit.

[mhhack]

Thanks to the moderators, mta and Andavari, for their comments. Like probably most of you, I have been faithfully using Ccleaner's Registry cleaner for years.

Their comments have had their impact; with Win 10 an evolving OS it's probably best to leave the registry alone, which I will do from here on.

The one unanswered question is the prominence that Ccleaner gives to their registry cleaner. Do they know something we don't?

[mta]

personally I think Piriform did (still do) a great crap removal product. (hence the origins of the name CCleaner)
I'm yet to find anything else that is as customisable as it.

then.... for some reason (competition, marketing, who knows) they decided to add extra services/features to the product, like reg cleaning, duplicate file finder, monitoring for example.
features I don't use and more often than not, have made systems worse due to their nature and use.

it seems, if you believe all the companies web sites that make these products, that users want a 'one stop shop' for all their PC maintenance needs.

 

[mhhack]

Thanks mta. I can understand the seeming need in today's software for as many services as possible. What I can't understand is why Piriform would add some potentially dangerous services, especially since MS itself denies their use. Were the older OS less susceptible? I guess so, since years of use by most of us never wrecked our PCs. In fact, up until a few weeks ago I used the registry cleaner, which seemed to operate as usual, finding some leftover entries, but 500+  seems a little much. I suppose that Piriform is aware of this, and I hope they offer a fix, but now I'm not sure I would use it at all.

For a kind of comparison, I used MS Disk Clean app, and it seems to clean just as well as Ccleaner, and when you allow Disk Clean to clean Windows Update it finds even more, in my case about 5gb more. So if you don't use Registry cleaner, wht's the point of Ccleaner at all?

 

[Andavari]

Microsoft themselves used to have a registry cleaner I'm thinking it was back in or near the Win98 era, it would break their own Office program if used, then fast forward a few years and they had one built into their online antivirus scanner and it too would damage Office and other some other stuff.

The point of CCleaner is it's extensible, just look at the winapp2.ini topic to learn more. Sure Disk Cleanup in Windows will clean allot if properly configured to do so, and you can even use things like Sageset and Sagerun to extend it more (see here, and here), but it won't clean MRU's in a program, Wipe Free Space, etc.

[mta]

1 hour ago, mhhack said:

For a kind of comparison, I used MS Disk Clean app, and it seems to clean just as well as Ccleaner, and when you allow Disk Clean to clean Windows Update it finds even more, in my case about 5gb more. So if you don't use Registry cleaner, wht's the point of Ccleaner at all?

A very valid point!

I also use the MS cleanmgr tool, occasionally, along with another 3rd party cleaner app (mainly to compare the areas cleaned) but CC's ability to be customised via winapp2.ini and INCLUDEs and EXCLUDEs still keep it in my 'must have' list.

I found a way to store in the registry your own customisations so cleanmgr can be just like CC but it still isn't as easy to setup or portable to other systems.

[mhhack]

This morning Malwarebytes was acting peculiarly, slowing my I5 laptop to a crawl, popping up tray notifications that didn't work, and in general even not allowing task manager to work!  I'm just getting sick and tired of all the time spent just trying to keep my laptop clean. I just had to finally uninstall Malwarebytes, and thing are running well, at least for now.

I've posed the invalid firewall question to Piriform, and their take is the these registry entries can be safely removed.  I explained that when the obsolete software box is unchecked these 500+ entries disappear. My laptop has restore points, and is image backed up, so I just let Ccleaner delete all the 500+ invalid firewall entries. Nothing changed, the laptop still is running decentlly So at this moment in time I have Windows Defender, Glasswire and Ccleaner working, and I'm using Disk Cleaner for cleanup along with Ccleaner.

[hazelnut]

1 minute ago, mhhack said:

This morning Malwarebytes was acting peculiarly, slowing my I5 laptop to a crawl, popping up tray notifications that didn't work, and in general even not allowing task manager to work!  I'm just getting sick and tired of all the time spent just trying to keep my laptop clean. I just had to finally uninstall Malwarebytes, and thing are running well, at least for now.

I've posed the invalid firewall question to Piriform, and their take is the these registry entries can be safely removed.  I explained that when the obsolete software box is unchecked these 500+ entries disappear. My laptop has restore points, and is image backed up, so I just let Ccleaner delete all the 500+ invalid firewall entries. Nothing changed, the laptop still is running decentlly So at this moment in time I have Windows Defender, Glasswire and Ccleaner working, and I'm using Disk Cleaner for cleanup along with Ccleaner.

Just in case... see here

https://forums.malwarebytes.com/topic/219996-important-web-blocking-ram-usage-issue/

and here

https://forums.malwarebytes.com/topic/219918-ram-usage-what-is-going-on/

[mhhack]

Thanks, Hazelnut. Reading through those forums cleared up the cause, but I'll still wait a while before reinstalling MB.  Funny how a lot of trusted software  I've used for years no longer has my immediate trust anymore. My reaction to all this is 'if it's not broke, don't fix it".

[Andavari]

Malwarebytes has always been high on RAM usage from what I've experienced. Personally I only use it as a second opinion scanner.

[mhhack]

4 hours ago, Andavari said:

Malwarebytes has always been high on RAM usage from what I've experienced. Personally I only use it as a second opinion scanner.

What is your first opinion scanner?

[Andavari]

Panda Dome ("aka Panda Free Antivirus"), primarily because it runs light on this old WinXP system.

[mhhack]

Thanks to all for all your comments. My original concern was about the 500+ invalid firewall entries, whether to delete them, and also where is the deleted software hiding, and how do the same invalid entries regenerate after being cleaned?