Kaspersky Small Office Security 4 blocks GoToAssist interaction

Given the proliferation of Kaspersky and Citrix GoToAssist, it is likely that remote support technicians, have encountered a situation whereby once Kaspersky is installed, you are unable to interact with its interface, remotely.

This is due to Kaspersky's built in Self-Defense feature, which for a few exceptions, blocks remote control software trying to interact with its interface.

Fortunately, there is a way to address this remotely.  Follow steps below:

  1. From the GoToAssist, reboot the remote host to Safe Mode.  Once in safe mode you will be able to interact with the Kaspersky interface.

If you are dealing with production servers, you may not want to reboot every time you need to interact with Kaspersky, so below are some steps to allow GoToAssist to interact with Kaspersky without having to be in Safe Mode:

  1. While in Safe Mode, from above step.
  2. Open Kaspersky Settings, from Programs group
  3. Select Additional options
  4. Select Threats and Exclusions
  5. Select Specify Trusted Applications
  6. Select Add to select related Application.  You may need to expand dialog box and columns to see the actual file name to select the appropriate application.  I initially had selected g2ax_host.exe as recommended by other articles, but that did not work and I continued to be unable to interact with the Kaspersky interface.  In my case, I needed g2ax_host_service.exe and g2ax_user_customer.exe.  I was able to derive what files I needed by looking at the GoToAssist running processes by peeking at the Windows Task Manager.
  7. Reboot host computer in regular mode

As a last resort, if you cannot specify the appropriate files to let your remote software to operate Kaspersky, you can disable the Self Defense feature, which is not recommended. To disable follow these steps:

  1. While in Safe Mode.
  2. Open Kaspersky Settings, from Programs group
  3. Select Additional
  4. Select Self Defense
  5. Remove check from Enable Self Defense check box
  6. Reboot host computer in regular mode

 

 

GoToAssist Reboot In Safe Mode option

Accessing Kaspersky Settings, once in Safe Mode

Accessing Kaspersky Threats and Exclusions

Specifying Trusted Applications for Remote Control Access to Kaspersky user interface

After clicking on the Add button on the Specify Trusted Applications screen, you will be able to select the related Citrix GoToAssist applications, one at a time.

Upon selecting each Trusted Application, you will need to select the exclusions.  Although I selected them all, you should only need to select Allow interaction with Kaspersky Small Office Security Interface.

Checking running GoToAssist applications, in order to identify these applications in the Kaspersky trusted applications settings.