How to Scan Removable Drives With Microsoft Defender
Microsoft Defender makes it easy to scan your Windows computer for viruses and malware. Several scans are available, including a quick and offline scan.
But did you know that you can also use Microsoft Defender to scan your removable and external drives? Here’s how.
Which Types of Microsoft Defender Scan Include Removable Drives?
You can set Microsoft Defender to doLimited Periodic Scanning, even when using alternative antivirus software on your computer. These will be Quick Scans, covering areas where malware threats are commonly found. These scans can include removable drives if they are connected at the time.
Aside from a Quick scan, Defender also allows Full, Custom, and Offline scans. Custom scans can be used to check removable drives, but surprisingly, your drives won’t be included in a Full scan by default. If you want your removable drives to be scanned during a Full scan, you need to enable it at a system settings level.
How to Scan Removable Drives With a Microsoft Defender Custom Scan
A custom scan is the best option if you only want toscan specific files or folders. You can use the custom scan to check folders on a removable drive, but not the drive itself. Even when scanning a large folder, a custom scan should only take moments to complete.
You can’t scan the whole drive, but you can check any file or folder on the drive. You could move all the files on the drive into a single folder and use the custom scan to check the whole folder. Although this isn’t practical on a large 1TB drive, it is an option to more easily scan a smaller USB flash drive.
How to Add Removable Drives to Full Scans in PowerShell
As mentioned earlier, a full virus scan won’t include your connected external or removable drives by default. If you want external drives to be included in a full scan, you need to tell Defender to do so. There is no simple option in Windows Security to enable this feature, but it’s possible to enable it in PowerShell. Here’s how you do it.
Be aware that by adding a large external drive to a scan, the time to complete the scan may increase a lot.
How to Include Removable Drives in a Full Scan With the Group Policy Editor
As long as you are using a Pro or Enterprise edition of Windows, you can also enable removable drive scanning in theLocal Group Policy Editor.
You can then close the Local Group Policy Editor. The next time you perform a full scan in Defender, any attached removable drives will also be scanned. If you want to disable removable drive scanning, repeat the steps above, but change the setting toNot ConfiguredorDisabled.
Scanning Your Removable Drives in Microsoft Defender
It isn’t always obvious which of the Microsoft Defender scan options will include external or removable drives. And it is surprising that a Full scan doesn’t by default. But with a simple change, your options for scanning your external drives and keeping your computer virus-free become much better.
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