Knowledgebase

ClamAV refuses to start and when viewing the status you see ConditionPathExistsGlob=/var/lib/clamav/daily.{c[vl]d,inc} was not met. This error means that ClamAV wasn't able to download any anti-virus signatures.

# systemctl status clamav-daemon
● clamav-daemon.service - Clam AntiVirus userspace daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/clamav-daemon.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
    Drop-In: /etc/systemd/system/clamav-daemon.service.d
             └─extend.conf
     Active: inactive (dead) since Thu 2021-09-09 04:02:59 MDT; 16min ago
  Condition: start condition failed at Thu 2021-09-09 04:08:49 MDT; 11min ago
             └─ ConditionPathExistsGlob=/var/lib/clamav/daily.{c[vl]d,inc} was not met
       Docs: man:clamd(8)
             man:clamd.conf(5)
             https://www.clamav.net/documents/

Common Problems

Freshclam should only be run once per hour as ClamAV will rate limit you otherwise:

# /usr/bin/freshclam -d --foreground=true
Thu Sep  9 04:22:56 2021 -> ClamAV update process started at Thu Sep  9 04:22:56 2021
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> ^Can't download daily.cvd from https://database.clamav.net/daily.cvd
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> ^FreshClam received error code 429 from the ClamAV Content Delivery Network (CDN).
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> This means that you have been rate limited by the CDN.
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> 1. Run FreshClam no more than once an hour to check for updates.
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> FreshClam should check DNS first to see if an update is needed.
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> 2. If you have more than 10 hosts on your network attempting to download,
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> it is recommended that you set up a private mirror on your network using
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> cvdupdate (https://pypi.org/project/cvdupdate/) to save bandwidth on the
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> CDN and your own network.
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> 3. Please do not open a ticket asking for an exemption from the rate limit,
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> it will not be granted.
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> ^You are on cool-down until after: 2021-09-09 08:22:57
Thu Sep 9 04:22:57 2021 -> main database available for download (remote version: 61)

Try to Download Them From the Command Line and Check For Errors

Centos/RHEL/CloudLinux/AlmaLinux

// first stop the freshclam service (Centos/RHEL/CloudLinux/AlmaLinux 8+ only)
systemctl stop clamav-freshclam

// run the freshclam command to try to download the signatures and check for any errors
/usr/bin/freshclam -d --foreground=true

// start up the freshclam service (Centos/RHEL/CloudLinux/AlmaLinux 8+ only)
systemctl start clamav-freshclam

// try to start clamav
 systemctl restart clamd@scan

Debian/Ubuntu

// first stop the freshclam service
systemctl stop clamav-freshclam

// run the freshclam command to try to download the signatures and check for any errors
/usr/bin/freshclam -d --foreground=true

// start up the freshclam service
systemctl start clamav-freshclam

// try to start clamav
systemctl restart clamav-daemon

Manually Downloading Signatures

As a last resort you can manually download ClamAV signatures from us to get ClamAV started:

// Centos/RHEL/CloudLinux/AlmaLinux
cd /var/lib/clamav/
wget https://www.danami.com/hotfix/clamav/main.cvd
wget https://www.danami.com/hotfix/clamav/daily.cld
chown clamupdate:clamupdate main.cvd
chown clamupdate:clamupdate daily.cld
systemctl restart clamd@scan

// Debian/Ubuntu
cd /var/lib/clamav/
wget https://www.danami.com/hotfix/clamav/main.cvd
wget https://www.danami.com/hotfix/clamav/daily.cld
chown clamav:clamav main.cvd
chown clamav:clamav daily.cld
systemctl restart clamav-daemon