BackupAssist Classic v10

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.6

October 1, 2020

• Fixed a performance regression from v10.5.4 for Cloud Backups of large files that have lots of empty space. E.g. fixed size virtual disks.
• Incremental Cloud Backup performance has been improved over the long term.
• Improved support for recoveries of Cloud Backups from Storage Accounts in Microsoft Azure with minimum TLS version of 1.1 and 1.2, which is the new Microsoft default.
• Fixed manual (offline) license activation that was broken in v10.5.5.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.5

September 1, 2020

• Fixed an issue that caused cloud backups to report a BA5 error (The backup terminated unexpectedly) if the cloud destination becomes unresponsive for more than 30 minutes.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.4

August 5, 2020

• Fixed a bug that allowed the “Switch Trial Experience“ option to be available after a license has been activated.
• Fixed an issue that prevented passwords being changed on WebDAV Cloud Backup jobs.
• Fixed an issue that caused Cloud Backup restores to fail due to the inability to write certain files to the user profile WindowsApps folder.
• Reduced the likelihood of getting a BA7002 error in a backup report, due to a timeout when uploading the catalogue to a cloud container.
• Fixed an issue that could cause a Hyper-V Granular Restore to fail due to the presence of AutoRecovery files in the backup.
• Improved the performance and stability of Cloud Backup jobs.
• Fixed an issue that could cause intermittent corruption of an Amazon S3 cloud container if the Discover Backups feature was used with the wrong region.
• Changed the structure of backup data in new WebDAV containers to improve performance and scalability. Note- existing Cloud Backup WebDAV jobs will continue to work as they were. The structure of the backup data will not change. The new backup data structure will only apply to new jobs created with 10.5.4 (and later).

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.3

May 20, 2020

BackupAssist 10.5.3 introduces our brand new product BackupAssist WFH, and a simple branding update for BackupAssist Classic.

BackupAssist WFH features easy configuration, central monitoring, and affordable per-user pricing, making it easy to back up your employees’ home computers. That’s easy cyber-resilience for your business and your employees!

See https://www.backupassist.com/wfh/overview for more information on BackupAssist WFH.

Known issues for BackupAssist WFH

The following two cases will be included in the next BackupAssist WFH release. In the meantime, please use the following workarounds.

Problem creating a BackupAssist WFH template for SMTP servers that do not require a username/password.

When creating a BackupAssist WFH template with an SMTP mail server that does not require a username/password, the Email reports to option will be greyed out and cannot be selected.

Here is the workaround:

1. From the Creating Work-From-Home template screen, select the Email Server settings link.
2. Firstly, enter the email server settings as normal and click Test settings and connection type to confirm.
3. Then enter a dummy username into the Username field. Do not set a password here.
4. Do not click the Test settings and connection type button.
5. Click OK to go back to the Creating Work-From-Home template screen.
6. The Email reports to option can now be selected.

Problem using a BackupAssist WFH template for a computer set up for CMC.

Currently, if you use a WFH template for a computer that has CMC set up (activated), that computer will not work with CMC.

Here is the workaround: Open BackupAssist WFH and select the Remote tab then Centralized Monitoring Setup. Now click Deregister then Register.

BackupAssist branding update

Here are the new splash screens.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.2r1

April 3, 2020

There was an issue in BackupAssist 10.5.2 which caused BackupAssist to hang under these conditions:

• If upgrading from a previous version of BackupAssist and there are existing rsync backup jobs.
• If creating a new rsync backup job using BackupAssist 10.5.2.

This release resolves these issues.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.2

April 2, 2020

• Fixed an issue that could cause a destination check to fail while the CryptoSafeGuard shield is enabled.
• A new error message BA1521 will be generated if an SQL Protection job has not backed up all of the databases selected in the backup job. This could be due to a timeout between BackupAssist and the SQL Server, or a difference in the selected databases and the databases that currently exist.
• Fixed an issue where a backup job’s catalogue would be deleted if that job ran again on the same day and failed.
• The License required warning shown on the SQL Protection button in the Create a new backup job screen, will now not be shown after an SQL Add-on is activated.
• Users can now dismiss product and trial expiration messages at the bottom of the BackupAssist UI.
• Removed an SQL Protection marketing popup that is no longer required.
• Removed text from the BitLocker settings on the Set up destination screen that said the BitLocker USB key needs to be plugged in during a backup, as this is no longer correct.
• BackupAssist and BackupAssist add-ons will not change their license status if a computer’s MAC address changes.
• The MSP grace period for BAaaS has been changed from 7 to 30 days, to match the licensing period. This will prevent licensing issues from affecting installs more than once per month.
• Fixed a problem introduced in BackupAssist 10.5.1 that resulted in a Site Controller occasionally losing its tunnel when connecting to MultiSite Manager after a Site Controller service is restarted.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.1

December 18, 2019

• Some Windows 10 versions released since early 2019 have included a bug that can be exposed when cataloging Data Containers, or when restoring from historical backups on Data Containers. The bug causes a critical disk subsystem to hang, and can result in a BSOD and a BA4 error in the backup report. This update avoids the bug and allows successful processing of Data Container backups on Windows 10.
  Note: If a hang has previously been detected on an installation then BackupAssist will prompt users to perform restores from historical backups on a different machine.
• Fixed an issue that could cause a File Archiving backup job to crash due to duplicate entries in the catalog.
• Made an update to handle ‘iSCSI target unavailable errors’ correctly for File Archiving and File Protection backups, avoiding incorrect deletion of backup folders.
• Added an improved fail-safe for backup-time detection of Exchange Servers running on guests from a Hyper-V host backup.
• Fixed issue to ensure that backups with large catalogs (> 4MB) can be successfully discovered from cloud containers.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.0r1

November 12, 2019

Update released to resolve an issue that caused File Archiving backups to tape drives to fail with error ‘BA707 The backup location is unavailable or has been disconnected’.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.0

October 30, 2019

New features

• BackupAssist now supports Exchange Server 2019. The Exchange Granular Restore add-on currently supports Exchange 2019 RTM and will be brought into line with the current cumulative update early next year. Exchange 2019 can also now be detected in a guest on the Hyper-V tab, when backing up a Hyper-V Server.
• BackupAssist now supports SQL 2017. This includes SQL cumulative update 6 and support for the SQL Continuous add-on.

Enhancements

• Added a new setting to the job creation wizard's Set up Destination screen called Start the first week of backups on this date. This new field allows you to set the date from which the job's backup schedule will start to run.
• A column showing the duration of a backup has been added to the Reports screen on both the Restore and Backup tabs."
• Updated CryptoSafeGuard with new detection rules for new ransomware types.
• When a backup job runs more than once a day, you can now send a report for each run of the backup instead of sending a collated report at the end of the day. Reports are collated by default, but collation can be disabled by selecting the Change button next to Multiple Time daily, and unticking 'Only send one report per day'.

Fixes

• Improved the resilience of the NAS destination authentication process especially when the NAS is on a different Domain/Workgroup than the BackupAssist machine.
• Update made to handle iSCSI target unavailable errors correctly for File Archiving and File Protection backups.
• Resolved an issue caused by Windows update 1803 that could prevent RecoverAssist from detecting NAS devices from the recovery environment.
• Email notifications will now work with versions of TLS greater than v1.0 when TLS v1.0 is disabled.
• Cloud Backups to AWS destinations will now work with versions of TLS greater than v1.0 when TLS v1.0 is disabled.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.1

December 18, 2019

• A site that loses its connection will try to reconnect. When it does, it will show up as a provisional site requiring approval. With this update, the site will appear in the provisional list with its machine and site names correctly, not just the FQDN as before.

BackupAssist Classic 10.5.0

October 30, 2019

• BackupAssist Desktop installations now correctly show what features are licensed.

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.7

June 27, 2019

This release resolves the following errors that were caused by Windows Update 1903:

• When backing up to a Data Container -“BackupAssist is not able to mount the VHD properly and therefore no backup can be made.”
• While generating the file catalog - “There was a problem mounting the virtual disk”.

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.6

May 23, 2019

In a recent Windows update, a change was made to Windows that resulted in additional false-positive detections in CryptoSafeGuard. This release updates CryptoSafeGuard to stop those false-positive detections.

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.5

March 21, 2019

Windows Server 2019 support

This release adds official BackupAssist basic support for Window Server 2019.

Basic support means all BackupAssist features, including all protection types and restore methods, have been tested and updated to ensure they work with a typical basic installation of Windows Server 2019.

Exchange Granular Restore

The following updates and fixes have been made to Exchange Granular Restore:

• Adds support for Exchange Server version 2013 CU21
• Adds support for Exchange Server version 2010 Update Rollup 24
• Improves the handling of recurring mail items
• Improves the reading of attachments in Exchange Server databases
• Improves the handling of restores to a live Exchange Server
• Fixes minor UI bugs
• Fixes issues with the display of embedded images in item preview

BackupAssist updates

• Fixed an issue that causes the BackupAssist services to shut down when a machine wake from sleep mode after 1.5 hours or longer.
• To assist in maintaining adequate backup storage space, a new Limit kept backups option has been added to the Destination section when you Edit a System Protection job and enable Manually manage space for backup history. This new option is available when using Windows Server 2012 or Windows 10 and later, and it is not enabled by default. It should be enabled if you only need to keep a certain number of backups, or if you have experienced VSS issues on the backup destination. The number of backups to keep will depend on the amount of free space at the destination and how much of the free space is used up each time a backup runs.

Local and Network drives for System Protection

Removable media for System Protection

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.4

February 13, 2019

• Fixed an issue with language auto detection in Windows 10 (build 1809) that causes BA2505 errors in System Protection backups.
• Fixed an issue with Windows 10 (build 1809) that prevents the selection of bare-metal when creating a System Protection backup.

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.3

November 1, 2018

CryptoSafeGuard

• BackupAssist's backup home page will display clearer, colored icon to indicate if CryptoSafeGuard is on or off.
• The CryptoSafeGuard settings UI will now have 3 tabs to separate the different sections.

Cloud Backup

• AWS cloud backup jobs will provide a serious warning if the AWS lifecycle feature is enabled as it can delete unchanged files (image chunks), rendering a backup unusable.
• Azure Cloud backups will now use the new Azure 'connection string' instead of the 'Account name' and Access key' on the Setup destination screen. Existing backups can still use the 'Account name' and Access key' and their backups will automatically be given a 'connection string' by Azure.

Selections screen

• The Estimate Size button on the Selection screen will now also calculate the size of selected VSS applications.

Backup User Identity

• For new installs BackupAssist will only prompt for a Backup User Identity for jobs that need to access NAS destinations or use the SQL add-on. BackupAssist will only prompt for the Backup User Identity once.

Application start up

• Sped up the application launch time

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.2

September 20, 2018

License and activation

• Fixed a BA Activation Error that would occur when a proxy server blocked backupassist.com
• Fixed a problem that stopped MSP license verification checks from refreshing due to web proxy caching.
• Enabled MultiSite Manager functionality for MSP-licensed installations. (Added since draft release notes)

File Protection

• File Protection jobs will now raise a BA740 condition (instead of a BA732) if a file-access error is the caused by the file being encrypted by NTFS.

CryptoSafeGuard

• Update made to reduce the probability of CryptoSafeGuard reporting false positive detections after installing certain Windows updates.

Job Creation

• Fixed an issue that prevented a newly created job named "Job" from showing on the Summary page up when editing it.

File Archiving

• When creating password-protected ZIP files as part of File Archiving jobs, the file and directory names will now be encrypted inside the ZIP file. This is to ensure that backups are GDPR compliant.
• To enhance the security of encrypted File Archiving backups, you can no longer view the names of files in the zip file. This means you cannot restore or unzip an encrypted backup using a third party tool like Winzip or 7-Zip (as you could previously). If you need to restore an encrypted File Archiving backup without BackupAssist, you will need to use our ZipRestoreFileNameMapper tool. To learn more, see the Show : Restore Considerations section in the File Archiving page

New backup creation option

BackupAssist 10.4.2 introduces a quick backup feature, designed to make a new user’s first backup job easy to create and run. This feature is called Create a backup quickly, and it will open when a new user starts BackupAssist. The focus is on asking only for the information needed (the source data location and backup destination) to make a File or System Protection backup. For existing users, Create a backup quickly will also be available from the Help menu.

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.1

July 11, 2018

Diagnostics

• Updated the Contact Support option in BackupAssist so that support requests can only be sent if diagnostics are enclosed.

Exchange Granular Restore

• Exchange Granular Restore has been updated to support Exchange 2016 Cumulative Update 9.

System Protection

• System Protection backup reports will now show backup history removed due to slow or busy storage devices. (support ref 1483)

RecoverAssist

• When a disk greater than 2 TB is used to create a bootable media, RecoverAssist will no longer limit usage of the disk to 2 TB. (support ref 1473)

BackupAssist Classic 10.4.0

May 23, 2018

Cloud Backup

• The number of concurrent TCP connections used when performing a backup to a WebDAV destination has been reduced to 2. This reduces the likelihood of getting skipped files when performing a backup.
• Fixed an error that could occur in WebDAV Cloud Backup and result in a backup failure.

CryptoSafeGuard

• Improve backup speed to protected NAS destination (GMC_BA-1404)
• Improved the performance of CryptoSafeGuard when a customer has to review thousands of suspicious files. (GMC_BA-1407)
• Fixed issue which caused multiple CryptoSafeGuard dialogs (suggesting that CryptoSafeGuard should be enabled) to be displayed after running multiple jobs with CryptoSafeGuard disabled.
• SQL backups made to a destination protected by CryptoSafeGuard shield will no longer fail with a BA1505 error.

User Interface

• Fixed a crash that could occur when editing the backup schedule of certain jobs migrated from v9.
• Added a fix to ensure that the CryptoSafeGuard options dialog displays properly on a 1024 x 768 resolution screen.
• Added an option to "keep track of prepared media" in the Prepare Media Wizard.
• Removed a non-functioning help link from the BitLocker options screen.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.5

March 21, 2019

Fixed the error handling of SMTP timeout issues in the email server setting screen.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.4

February 13, 2019

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.3

November 1, 2018

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.2

September 20, 2018

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.1

July 11, 2018

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.4.0

May 25, 2018

• Added TLS 1.1 and 1.2 (previously SSL) support to MultiSite Manager.
• Added TLS 1.1 and 1.2 (previously SSL) support to BackupAssist.

BackupAssist Classic 10.3.1

April 23, 2018

Cloud Backup

• Added the ability to configure the following replication options for Cloud backups: copying NTFS Security Attributes, Display of Reparse Point warnings, and enforcing Maximum Allowed Skipped Files (GMC_BA-1408)
• Improved the error logging for Cloud Backup jobs.
• Improved the error reporting when the wrong encryption password is used during a Cloud Backup restore.
• Implemented a change to prevent the error BA7002 from occurring if there is a timeout while validating the upload of the catalogue at the end of a Cloud Backup. (GMC_BA-1463)

CryptoSafeGuard

• Implemented a change to prevent error BA8006 (An unexpected error occurred during the CryptoSafeGuard detection step) when scanning certain file types that are locked by another process.(GMC_BA-1450)
• Addressed an issue where CSG was not detecting some versions of Dharma ransomware. (GMC_BA-1454)

Destinations

• Fixed an iSCSI client error that could result in a backup job being deleted. (GMC_BA-1356)

Exchange Granular Restore Add-on

• Exchange Granular Restore now supports the Exchange Server 2016 cumulative update 7.

File Protection

• Enhanced the Replication option when editing a File Protection job to allow more control over the NTFS Stream Copy behavior.

System Protection

• Fixed a bug that occurred when processing logs for Windows Server 2008 backups. (GMC_BA-1444)

File Archiving

• Improved the maximum skipped files limit logic for File Archiving backups. (GMC_BA-1462)

BackupAssist Classic 10.3.0

March 7, 2018

Cloud Backup

• Fixes to improve the reliability and performance of cloud backups.
• Made an update so that un-referenced data will now be removed from cloud containers. This will save storage costs. (GMC_BA-1317)

CryptoSafeGuard

• Confirming a ransomware infection when there is a yellow banner (i.e. during a job's grace period, or if there is a low-risk of infection) will now block all jobs to ensure that the backups are kept safe.
• Fixed an issue where jobs would become automatically unblocked (without a meaningful message) after clicking on the yellow or red CryptoSafeGuard banner in a small number of scenarios.
• The CryptoSafeGuard algorithm has been modified to reduce the likelihood of false positives when scanning source files for signs of ransomware infection.
• Fixed an issue where the "Whitelist selected file(s)" button would sometimes be incorrectly greyed-out in the CryptoSafeGuard potential infection dialog.

File Protection (Rsync)

• Made a fix for rsync daemon server running on Windows Server 2016, so that when SSH instances are ended, they completely terminate and subsequent backups are not blocked from communicating with the rsync server. (GMC_BA-1384)

Restore Console

• Fixed a bug which caused an exception to occur while performing a restore.

System Protection

• If the destination media does not have enough space when running a System Protection backup job, a more specific error code (BA 2551) will now be logged into the report instead of the more generic error code (BA 2511).
•  

MultiSite Manager 10.3.1

April 23, 2018

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.3.0

March 7, 2018

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

BackupAssist Classic 10.2.2

December 6, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

• 29340 Reduced CPU and memory usage when running a CryptoSafeGuard manual scan.
• 29353 Fixed a bug that can prevent granular restores from Data Container backups when CryptoSafeGuard is enabled.
• 29375 CryptoSafeGuard will no longer abort a scan if it encounters certain illegal characters in the scan's path.
• 29252 CryptoSafeGuard has been given further optimizations so that scans will run faster.
• 29352 If the "Make network connections" step fails when performing a CryptoSafeGuard manual scan, we will now log a BA13 error and abort the scan.
• 28951 Added an option to disable the CryptoSafeGuard shield, while leaving the CryptoSafeGuard Detector enabled.
• 29411 Canceling a CryptoSafeGuard manual scan will no longer log a BA8006 error in the report.
• 29342 CryptoSafeGuard will no longer be inadvertently disabled after an upgrade if it was previously enabled.
• 28811 CryptoSafeGuard's results file is now compressed to reduce the amount of disk space that is used.
• 28954 CryptoSafeGuard now protects the location of a Data Container, as well as the contents.
• 29258 Applied fixes to prevent QuickBooks auto data recovery (*.adr) files from generating false positives during a CryptoSafeGuard scan.
• 28894 When performing a scan, CryptoSafeGuard will no longer scan the Recycle Bin on any volume or Hyper-V guest. (GMC_BA-1328)

RecoverAssist

• 29022 Fix recoveries from Data Container backups on Server 2016 and Windows 10.
• 29098 Support building recovery media from Windows install media and installation that use ESD files instead of WIM.

iSCSI

• 29316 Fixed a bug that causes jobs to be lost if the iSCSI portal is not available when the BackupAssist service starts.

Reports / Notifications

• 29266 Fixed an issue for environments where reminder notifications are enabled and backups run on Sundays, which caused repeated notifications to be sent during the repeated hour 2am-3am on the day that daylight savings ends. (GMC_BA-1375)

Restore Console

• 27915 Added an 'insufficient disk space' pop-up notification to Hyper-V Granular Restore.

User Interface

• 29242 & 29013 Fix to prevent errors when doing the following on Windows Server Core installations:
  • Clicking on the CryptoSafeGuard help link.
  • Clicking "Open selected folder" inside potential infection dialog (this option has been removed on Server Core).
  • Adding an "ignored file path" to the CryptoSafeGuard whitelist

System Protection

• 28590 If some VSS components fail but the imaging backup completed, errors will be reported as warnings instead of failing the whole backup.

VSS

• 28591 Improved the handling of certain VSS issues to avoid BA917 errors from stopping backup jobs.

BackupAssist Classic 10.2.1

November 8, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

• 29114 Fixed a problem that causes System Protection backups to freeze at the catalog stage when the backup destination is a Data Container and CryptoSafeGuard is enabled.

• 29114 Fixed a problem that stopped the BackupAssist Console from opening after a System Protection job has run, when the backup destination is a Data Container and CryptoSafeGuard is enabled.

BackupAssist Classic 10.2.0

October 31, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

• 29126 When opening CryptoSafeGuard's potential infection dialog after a scan, suspicious files from jobs which have been deleted will be filtered out.
• 29105 Flattened right-click context menus inside CryptoSafeGuard whitelist dialog. This makes it faster and easier to whitelist files and directories.
• 29070 Fixed a bug where opening the whitelist dialog after a failed CryptoSafeGuard scan would immediately unblock jobs without giving the user the option to whitelist files.

SQL Add-on

• 28949 Fix removal of SQL databases from backup job selections after running a backup when SQL server is not available. (GMC_BA-1297)

User Interface

• 29140 Fixed an exception that could occur when opening the BackupAssist console on a Windows Server 2012R2 (non-Core) machine that has the Windows "Server Graphical Shell" feature uninstalled.

MultiSite Manager 10.2.2

December 6, 2017

Email

• 29318 MultiSite Manager will now show a warning in the daily emails for computers where there are no backups scheduled, instead of showing success. (GMC_BA-1364)

MultiSite Manager 10.2.1

November 8, 2017

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.2.0

October 31, 2017

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

BackupAssist Classic 10.1.3

October 12, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

• 29034 Due to limitations in Windows Server 2008 / 2008R2, this update will prevent CryptoSafeGuard from scanning inside of guests on Server 2008 / 2008R2 hosts, because when CryptoSafeGuard deletes a checkpoint, the .avhd checkpoint files are not removed until the guest is restarted. This could cause the host machine to eventually run out of disk space.
• 28870 Fixed an issue that caused CryptoSafeGuard's potential infection dialog to display an error when it's first opened on Windows Server Core.
• 28959 The CryptoSafeGuard detection SMS message has changed to "Ransomware detected on machine %COMPUTER_NAME%". An additional message (maximum of 30 characters) can be configured, which will be appended to the end of the standard SMS message to help identify the machine.
• 29060 Updated CryptoSafeGuard to ensure that it is fully supported by MSP subscriptions.
• 28863 If CryptoSafeGuard is disabled, all jobs will be automatically unblocked, if they are currently blocked due to a potential ransomware infection.
• 28915 Increase the range of digits that can be used in the SMS number validation.
• 28722 CryptoSafeGuard will now rename the temporary Hyper-V guest (VM) checkpoints so that they are easily identifiable.
• 28916 CryptoSafeGuard will now delete any left-over Hyper-V guest (VM) checkpoints from previous scans.
• 28873 Added ability for users to increase the timeout on creating temporary Hyper-V guest (VM) checkpoints during a CryptoSafeGuard scan.
• 28797 Fixed backup error reporting for rare CryptoSafeGuard failures in some System Protection jobs.
• 28784 If any unexpected errors occur during the CryptoSafeGuard backup protection step, they will now be reported as BA8007: "An unexpected error occurred during the CryptoSafeGuard protection step". Previously, these would be logged as unhandled exceptions in the backup report.

User Interface

• 28802 Fixed an issue with the detection of some Window Server Core 2016 installs that caused issues with some UI features.

Reports / Notifications

• 27950 BackupAssist will now report VSS applications that were not fully backed up to a cloud destination due to skipped files.

Settings / Logging

• 28936 Update made to prevent the creation of corrupt backup catalogs that could occur in very exceptional circumstances.

BackupAssist Classic 10.1.2

September 21, 2017

Updates to Exchange Granular Restore to support Exchange Server 2016 CU5:

• Resolved problems with a selected item's content and properties only being partially displayed while browsing the mail store tree
• Resolved problems with displaying deleted items.

Exchange Granular Restore fixes:

• Resolved problems with exporting into the original Exchange mailbox
• Resolved problems with exporting into a 2007 and 2010 live Exchange Server
• Resolved problems with converting special symbols to UTF-8 encoding.

BackupAssist Classic 10.1.1

September 12, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

• 28837 Fixed a critical bug that means CryptoSafeGuard does not remove its temporary Hyper-V guest checkpoint in some cases, after CryptoSafeGuard has finished its scan. Without this fix, the host disks could run out of free space potentially causing guests to fail.
• 28812 Fixed an error that could occur when opening the CryptoSafeGuard alert banner. This error occurs in rare cases for files detected in Hyper-V guests. (GMC_BA-1294)
• 28824 Fixed a problem that causes files in guests to still be scanned by CryptoSafeGuard after those files have been whitelisted. This problem only occurs in guests with non-NTFS file systems. (GMC_BA-1295)

Learn more

Detailed release notes for BackupAssist Classic 10.1.1

Update 1: 28837 CryptoSafeGuard does not remove temporary Hyper-V checkpoints

When running on Hyper-V hosts, CryptoSafeGuard scans the files inside guests that are selected for backup, to check for signs of ransomware attack, as well as scanning the local Hyper-V system. A key phase in the guest-scanning process is that a Hyper-V checkpoint is temporarily created, to give a static view of the guest’s files. The checkpoints created are removed after the scan phase of the backup is completed.

Note: Checkpoints are also known as Hyper-V snapshots.

What is the issue?

On some systems, certain conditions can cause the checkpoint process to stall, and when this happens, CryptoSafeGuard thinks the checkpoint has failed. If this happens, the checkpoint could still eventually be created, but it won’t be removed even after the scanning phase has completed.

Guests with Hyper-V checkpoints run on separate differencing disks, and over time can come to use a significant amount of diskspace. If the above problem occurs in every backup, the amount of “incremental” changes in each differencing disk could result in the host volumes becoming filled up. If this happens, guest integrity is at risk, as files being written by guests that are hosted on those volumes could fail, potentially causing corruption.

What installs are affected?

The problem can occur under the following conditions:

• Running BackupAssist 10.1.0, 10.1.0r1, or 10.1.0r2
• CryptoSafeGuard is enabled
• One or more jobs are scheduled with Hyper-V guest selections
• Selected guests take more than 30 seconds to checkpoint

What is the resolution?

Affected users should take the following steps:

1. Log onto any affected Hyper-V machines
2. Review all guest checkpoints using Hyper-V Manager
3. Delete any unwanted checkpoints
4. Upgrade the BackupAssist installs to BackupAssist 10.1.1

You can also see these instructions a our Critical update page.

Note: Steps 1) to 3) are mandatory. CryptoSafeGuard can be disabled as an alternative to step 4), however this on its own will NOT clean up any unwanted checkpoints, and won’t prevent the issue described above.

Update 2: 28824 CryptoSafeGuard alert banner exception for some guest-detected files

When certain guest files are detected as a potential threat, the UI fails with an unhandled exception when the red CryptoSafeGuard alert banner is clicked. This means that jobs cannot be unblocked, so backups will not be executed as expected.

Who is affected?

The problem is seen on machines where:

• Running BackupAssist 10.1.0, 10.1.0r1, or 10.1.0r2
• CryptoSafeGuard is enabled.
• One or more Hyper-V guests are selected for backup
• It detects a file inside a guest that is a threat. And that file has a character length (pathname plus file name) of 214 or 215 or 216 characters.

What is the resolution?

To solve the issue, upgrade to BackupAssist 10.1.1.

It is also possible to work around the issue without upgrading (not recommended):

1. Rename the folder C:\ProgramData\BackupAssist v10\CryptoSafeGuardResults\
2. Re-start the BackupAssist Console and click on the red banner to unblock jobs
3. Disable CryptoSafeGuard temporarily as a workaround to avoid the issue

Update 3: 28812 CryptoSafeGuard whitelist not working for Hyper-V guest files on non-NTFS volumes

When CryptoSafeGuard detects files as a threat inside a Hyper-V guest, whitelisting those files prevents the files from being detected in further backups.

The issue is that if the whitelisted files are contained in guest volumes that are formatted with FAT32 or any other non-NTFS file system (eg. as is common on Windows XP or Server 2003), then these whitelisted files are not skipped as expected, so CryptoSafeGuard continues to block jobs.

Who is affected?

The problem is seen on machines where:

• CryptoSafeGuard is enabled
• One or more Hyper-V guests are selected for backup
• CryptoSafeGuard detects that one or more files on a non-NTFS volume inside one of these guests is a threat

What is the resolution?

To solve the issue, upgrade to BackupAssist 10.1.1.

It is also possible to work around the issue without upgrading, by simply disabling CryptoSafeGuard (not recommended).

BackupAssist Classic 10.1.0 R2

September 1, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard

BackupAssist 10.1.0 introduces CryptoSafeGuard, a new tool designed to protect your backups from ransomware.

To respond to a ransomware attack, it’s critical that you have reliable backups so you can restore data or recover your entire system. However, ransomware can also infect your backups, leaving them unusable.

CryptoSafeGuard protects your backups from ransomware using two features:

• CryptoSafeGuard Detector - When a backup job starts, CryptoSafeGuard scans the data being backed up. If there is any sign of a possible ransomware infection, all backup jobs will be blocked from running, and email and SMS alerts will be sent if configured.
• CryptoSafeGuard Shield - CryptoSafeGuard protects your backups from ransomware by allowing only BackupAssist to create, delete or update data in your backups. This feature runs automatically in the background when CryptoSafeGuard is enabled.

Other updates

Help / Documentation

• 27407 Updated the documentation links in the Welcome Screen to redirect to the new web-based context sensitive help system.

File Archiving

• 28491 Files with path names that do not conform to Windows file naming conventions will be skipped.

User Interface

• 28409 Fixed an exception in Windows Server Core, when trying to access in-product help.
• 28559 Fixed a WMI related issue that could cause BackupAssist to crash.

Hyper-V

• 28196 Fixed an issue that caused Exchange Hyper-V guests to show a size of '0' in backup reports.

CryptoSafeGuard

• 28770 Fixed BA101 / BA102 / BA103 errors when initializing CryptoSafeGuard scanning on jobs backing up VSS applications where Hyper-V is not installed

MultiSite Manager 10.1.3

October 12, 2017

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.1.2

September 21, 2017

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.1.1

September 13, 2017

There were no updates for MultiSite Manager in this release.

MultiSite Manager 10.1.0 R1

September 1, 2017

CryptoSafeGuard integration

MultiSite Manager will now show if jobs are blocked due to a possible ransomware detection and if the BackupAssist installation has CryptoSafeGuard enabled or disabled.

User Interface

• 28757 Improved responsiveness in MultiSite Manager UI to show a computer’s “Blocked by CryptoSafeGuard” status

BackupAssist Classic 10.0.2

July 12, 2017

Reports / Notifications

• 28248 Updated the backup reports and Monitor screen so they do not report Backup Verification activities which were deprecated in v10.0.0.

BitLocker

• 28198 You will no longer experience the “unhandled exception” error when an attempt to unlock a BitLocker drive is unsuccessful.

Cloud Backup

• 28261 Fixed a Hyper-V guest cataloging error that would occur when a file name had an invalid Unicode character.

Exchange Granular Restore Add-on

• 28222 A new revision of Exchange Granular Restore is included in this release. It addresses known crashes related to Exchange 2016 with Cumulative Update 5.

BackupAssist Classic 10.0.1

June 21, 2017

Backup Verification

• 28084 Stopped backup verification from running in jobs migrated from V9 or earlier, to v10.

Cloud Backup

• 27882 For Amazon Cloud Backups, when the region is changed after the bucket's been created, performing a Check destination or running the backup will result in an error message with advice on how to proceed.
• 27995 Improved the performance and stability of Cloud Backup restores for large files.
• 28106 Upgraded the Azure .NET client library to 8.1.3.
• 26258 Fixed the data size values reported in CMC for Cloud Backup jobs, and also the CMC Data Usage report.
• 27974 Increased the accuracy of the Cloud Backup report's backup size and number of files.
• 27920 Fixed an error that caused an incorrect timestamp to show when 'Overwrite other files' was selected for a Cloud Backup restore.
• 28132 Fixed a minor metadata issue that prevented the restoring of attributes and timestamps for a folder representing a backed up volume.

RecoverAssist

• 28090 Extended the time out period for Bootable Backups to allow more time for them to be successfully created.

Reports / Notifications

• 26644 Fixed an issue that resulted in the Hyper-V section being left out of the Cloud Backup report for some scenarios.

Restore Console

• 27678 Fixed an issue that resulted in Hyper-V Granular Restore not giving a prompt to save files extracted from a Windows 2016 Data Center (Windows Core) backup.
• 28093 Made a change to the restore progress bar so that it updates correctly when restoring files from a Hyper-V guest.

Server 2016

• 27993 Improved support for backups of Hyper-V guests with checkpoints in Server 2016.

User Interface

• 27154 Enhanced the BackupAssist migration UI so that BackupAssist will still open if the user closes the dialog instead of selecting Finish.

BitLocker

• 28092 Fixed the backup report's Media Usage section for some BitLocker job types.

MultiSite Manager 10.0.2

July 12, 2017

Email

• 24075 Fixed an error in MultiSite Manager that occurred when backup reports were given multiple recipients.

MultiSite Manager 10.0.1

June 21, 2017

Email

• 28091 Updated the daily notification Email subjects to include summaries of the site or machine's status.