Recover Windows Security Deleted Files and Stop Deleting

Why Windows Defender is deleting my files?

We all know that malware and malicious files will cause serious issues on a Windows PC. In our daily use, in addition to the regular inspection and elimination of these threats by users ourselves, Windows Defender plays an irreplaceable role.

Windows Defender is a built-in antivirus application from Microsoft. This threat detection and removal tool searches the computer and removes dangers like viruses and malware that may harm the system. However, this inbuilt utility occasionally eliminates files that are virus-free by mistake since it detects those files as a danger.

How to restore Windows Security deleted files?

Windows Defender moves files to a secure location where they cannot harm your computer. Quarantined files will remain there for a limited time before being automatically deleted. So you could try to see if your desired files are still available.

In this part, we’ll show how to recover files deleted by Windows Defender.

Step 1. Go to Virus & threat protection > click Protection history.

Step 2. You can view the quarantined files and process them as you like. Click Actions > Restore.

How to stop Windows security from deleting files?

If Windows Security affects your normal files, then it’s necessary to stop it from deleting files automatically from your computer. In this part, we’ll show you some ways to turn off this service on your Windows PC.

Way 1. Add Exceptions to Windows Security

Note: Make sure target files are safe to add to the exclusions.

Step 1. Click Start menu > Windows Settings > Update & Security > Windows Security > Virus & threat protection to open Windows Security.

Step 2. Click on the “Manage Settings” button on the top right of the interface, then the corresponding window will pop up.

Step 3. At this time, you click on “Add or remove exclusions”.

Step 4. Click “Add an exclusion”, and choose to Exclude a file, Exclude a folder, Exclude a file extension or Exclude a .exe, .com, or .scr process.

You can add as many files and folders to the exclusion list as you want. Besides, if you add a wrong file/folder/file type/process, you may just click on it and choose Remove. After that, you can close the Settings window to put an end to this work.

Way 2. Turn off Windows Defender

This way has 2 approaches to disable Windows Defender. We’ll show how to disable it in Settings at first, then we’ll use Local Group Policy Editor to do it.

Part 1. Using Settings to turn off Windows Defender

Step 1. Go to Virus & threat protection settings > Manage settings.

Step 2. Switch off the Real-time protection.

Part 2. Using Local Group Policy Editor

Step 1. Press Win + R on the keyboard to open the Run command.

Step 2. Then, type gpedit.msc into the text box and click on the OK to open the Local Group Policy Editor window. (You can also type gpedit.msc into the Search the web and Windows text box and then press Enter to open Local Group Policy Editor directly.)

Step 3. Open Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, and Windows Components one after another to locate Windows Defender.

Step 4. Select Windows Defender Antivirus > Real-time Protection and double-click on Turn off real-time protection in the right panel.

Step 5. Then, check Enabled (instead of Not Configured) and click on Apply button in the lower right corner.

Step 6. At last, click on the OK button to save changes and close the Turn off Windows Defender window.

Further reading: How to recover lost partition on the Windows PC?

Besides the files, some users also meet that the partition is lost after an update or lost partition suddenly on the disk (usually on the external disk). This situation is not common. In most cases, this problem is caused by users’ errors, corrupted partition tables, bad sectors, drive settings changed…

Unlike the files deleted by the Windows Defender that you can recover via Windows Security settings, the lost partition could only be recovered by resetting drive letters in CMD or a professional recovery tool.

If you’re not familiar with the CMD commands, we suggest you immediately use professional tools like AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional to recover the lost partition. This tool doesn’t require any complex computer knowledge or typing commands. You can quickly and easily retrieve lost partitions with a few clicks.

Step 1. Find the lost partition in Disk Management. Install and open AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional.

Step 2. Click the target partition you need to recover. Then move on to the top toolbar. Select “Recover” > “Partition Recovery”.

Step 3. Select Fast Search. It is recommended that you select this option the first time as it is faster than Full Search. If you are unable to recover the lost partition using Fast Search then I recommend you try the Full Search option.

Step 4. Select the lost partition and click Proceed.

Step 5. Click Finish to exit this window after you see the congratulations message.

Ending lines

If you find your Windows security delete files automatically, try the solutions in this post. And if the partitions on the disk disappear, AOMEI Partition Assistant can help you. Besides recovering lost partitions, this handy tool can also clone disks, migrate OS, convert disks to MBR/GPT without deleting partitions, move folders and installed programs…

What’s more, if you’re using Windows Server PC, you can choose the Server Edition to conveniently manage your Server system.