Temporarily Disable Symantec Endpoint Protection?

I would like to temporarily disable Symantec Endpoint Protection. I know that this is done by right clicking the tray icon in the Windows, and then clicking enable/disable.

What I would like to do is write a program that handles this "clicking" for me. I started by writing a script that simply moves the mouse and does the clicking, however this does not work very well, and only half the time.

Is there any better way to do this? Like perhaps sending an input to SEP that signals it to temporarily disable?

Welf Ludwig

Posted 2011-06-02T03:23:25.963

Reputation: 61

If it were easy to do this, Malware would have no problem disabling Norton to do its nasty deeds, it is meant to be difficult to disable without user interaction. – Moab – 2011-06-02T15:05:06.140

Answers

I use the corporate version, so I am not sure if the service name is the same. You can check here: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services(name of service...you may have to search for Symantec)

Write a small batch file (name it stop_SEP.bat) with the following command: net stop "Symantec AntiVirus"

You can set the time within the program for how long it stays stopped before automatically restarting. The default on the corporate version is 5 minutes. It is probably somewhere like this: Change Settings>File System Auto-Protect>Advanced>When Auto-Protect is disabled, enable after

If you disable automatic restarts totally, you can create start_SEP.bat with this command: net start "Symantec AntiVirus".

Put them, or a shortcut to them in a convenient place.

If this works for you, please come back and mark the question as answered.

KCotreau

Posted 2011-06-02T03:23:25.963

Reputation: 24 985

Thanks. The good thing about this method is that it also works if you have Log(zero) authorizations. – Alain Pannetier – 2016-04-13T15:26:49.890

If there is no password protection, smc -stop should do the trick.

patricks

Posted 2011-06-02T03:23:25.963

Reputation: 616

this suggests it doesn't disable AV: http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/smc-stop-command-line-function

– Rory – 2013-03-25T20:37:09.667

You can also just create a batch file with the following command:

start smc - stop

The start helps locate the smc service and stops it.

With the -start command, it will start again.

Dhruv

Posted 2011-06-02T03:23:25.963

Reputation: 1