[clamav-users] Freshclam can't get started

[Matthew Campbell]

These are the permission in /var/local/

2 /var/local # ls -al
total 48
drwxr-xr-x 9 root root 4096 Jul 27 08:01 .
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 Oct 1 15:39 ..
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Oct 4 05:24 aide
drwsrws--- 3 clamav clamav 4096 Oct 3 12:53 clamav
drwx------ 3 root root 4096 Jun 22 17:29 lib
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Jul 25 06:24 log
drwx------ 2 root root 16384 Jun 20 23:27 lost+found
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Jul 21 11:17 lynis
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Jul 21 07:12 nacctd
2 /var/local #

I use a separate file system to keep private data away from the root partition. I use ClamAV for general malware scanning.

Unfortunately my email app insists on quoting previous replies. Sorry about that.

name=Matthew%20Campbell&email=trenix25%40pm.me

-------- Original Message --------
On Oct 3, 2020, 4:42 PM, G.W. Haywood via clamav-users wrote:

> Hi there,
>
> On Sat, 3 Oct 2020, Matthew Campbell via clamav-users wrote:
>
>> I've had this problem since I started using Debian Linux months ago. I'm using Debian Linux 10.6.
>>
>> /var/local/clamav # freshclam -v --debug -F --user clamav
>> ERROR: Can't open /var/local/clamav/freshclam.log in append mode (check permissions!).
>> ...
>> Directory permisions for /var/local/clamav are 06770 owned by clamav:clamav.
>
> Is there any particular reason for using the /var/local/ directory?
> I thought Debian maintainers tended to use /var/lib/ more often.
>
> Anyway, either you've done something strange to the system or those
> aren't the permissions. Please could you paste the output of
>
> ls -l /var/local/
>
> into a message and let us see what you've got? Here's an example from
> one of my systems. You'll see that there is an 'x' in the fourth
> column of every line. If you don't have that, then that might be a
> problem - but it might not be the only one.
>
> $ ls -l /var
> total 48
> drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Oct 3 06:47 backups
> drwxr-xr-x 12 root root 4096 Dec 23 2019 cache
> drwxr-xr-x 43 root root 4096 Jul 29 12:12 lib
> drwxrwsr-x 2 root staff 4096 Aug 30 2019 local
> lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 9 Sep 19 2019 lock -> /run/lock
> drwxr-xr-x 18 root root 12288 Oct 2 13:34 log
> drwxrwsrwt 2 root mail 4096 Oct 2 05:36 mail
> drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Sep 19 2019 opt
> lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 Sep 19 2019 run -> /run
> drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Oct 8 2019 spool
> drwxrwxrwt 2 root root 4096 Oct 3 06:47 tmp
> drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Dec 23 2019 www
>
>> File permissions for /var/local/clamav/freshclam.log are 0660 owned by clamav:clamav.
>
> That should be OK if clamav is the UID that's running freshclam.
>
>> I get my copies of ClamAV as a Debian package. I used apt install
>> clamav. I just upgraded everything to Debian 10.6 two days ago.
>> I can't seem to get the malware database started. How do I fix this?
>
> You could remove all the clamav packages (there's more than one) and
> purge them, then reinstall. But if you've done really strange things
> to some directory permissions you might need to do a bit more work.
>
> What do you plan to use ClamAV for?
>
> --
>
> 73,
> Ged.
>
> _______________________________________________
>
> clamav-users mailing list
> clamav-users at lists.clamav.net
> https://lists.clamav.net/mailman/listinfo/clamav-users
>
> Help us build a comprehensive ClamAV guide:
> https://github.com/vrtadmin/clamav-faq
>
> http://www.clamav.net/contact.html#ml
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.clamav.net/pipermail/clamav-users/attachments/20201004/8b14f1f5/attachment.htm>