Don't have ability to delete window defender scan history

Hi Jacky AM,

Welcome to the Microsoft community and thank you for asking your question in the community!

According to your description, you have problems when you try to delete Windows Defender's protection logs, and you have tried many methods to achieve the deletion operation. I understand your feelings and I hope you can try the following options to delete the scan logs:

1. Enter Safe Mode

2. Enter CMD in the search box , right-click on the command prompt, and select Run as administrator.

3. Copy and paste the following command and press enter to execute.

del "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows Defender\Scans\History" /s /q /f /p

Please let me know if I have misunderstood. Tell us the results and we will get back to you as soon as possible. We look forward to hearing from you.

Best regards,

Zhang Yang - MSFT | Microsoft Community Support Specialist

Good Morning,

Thank you. That seem to have done it. I am able to access the games now. But there is some concern, so now the protection history just crash immediately, where previously it'll try to load before crashing and exiting. Now its not even trying.

Also, when I got to the CMD step and after I enter the line of code, it prompt me to delete I think 6 different files, all are under the Scans\ History. I did that,

everything seem to be working fine now, but I know nothing about computers so I hope I didn't break anything.

Is there a way to just do a complete reset of just the Windows Defender?

Thank you for your reply! We are glad that your crash was resolved. The file you deleted was only the scan history file, and it will not affect your other files, so please rest assured.

Regarding your request to reset Windows Denfender, please follow the steps below:

Press the "Windows Logo Key + X" shortcut to launch "Windows PowerShell (Administrator)", enter the following commands in order and press Enter:

sfc /SCANNOW 

Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth 

Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth 

DISM /Online /Cleanup-image /RestoreHealth 

reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender" /v "DisableAntiSpyware" /d 1 /t REG_DWORD /f 

reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender" /v "DisableAntiSpyware" /d 0 /t REG_DWORD /f

Restart your computer after the operation is completed.

Please let me know if I have misunderstood. Tell us the results and we will get back to you as soon as possible. We look forward to hearing from you.

Best regards,

Zhang Yang

Good Evening,

Thank you for the help. The "Virus and Threat Protection" of Window Defender is still crashing when I attempt to launch it after following your steps above. But I don't think it matters, at least not right now. I went through the files that it blocks, most of it involves items that are multiplayer online, which I only have a few of. Those that I do have at the moment, all are now playable so that's all it matters for me.

Thank you again, I was just stress out after work and the finals, then coming home to relax and then this occur.

I do have one quick question I don't know if you have the answer to:

Is there kind of an overwrite program in the Window Defender log that'll delete older items? I don't know much about computer systems but when the Window Defender was still working, I was looking at probably over 40 items and so dating back to February.