Norton CPU spikes every 2 seconds causes Desktop icons to flash.

I am having this type of problem also.

I think I've sort of found a not so great work around that I'll continue to test ...

I've found that while watching my CPU usage on the task manager, I can open Norton 360 by clicking on the desktop icon, and as soon as it opens I immediately close it.  Most times as soon as I close it the CPU usage and flashing cursor goes away.  A few times after opening Chrome, Norton statred acting up, and as soon as I click on the icon and rapidly close it appears to fix the issue.  You need to close the Norton rapidly or it will continue to crunch the CPU.

If you open Norton by clicking on the desktop icon again, it will start up with the CPU usage problems again.  I also noticed if I reboot my system and watch the CPU usage in the task manager, the issue doesn't start until Norton starts after reboot.

Everything is pointing to this being the result of a Norton live update in the last 24 hrs, or Norton is not playing well with some sort of Windows update in the last 24 hrs.  Since I've have updates paused (since Sunday) and given that rapidly opening Norton and closing temporarily fixes the issue, it really seems to be pointing to a Norton issue

I spent hours today thinking my computer was infected but it ends up being Norton hammering my CPU and disk for no reason and like you said 1-2 second intervals and the hour glass pops up constantly. SO annoying I had to uninstall it and now I'm noid about defender being the only thing running..

Sketch but I can't take the Norton problems any longer hopefully they fix it 

Yep ... checked all of that.  I don't use fast startup and restarted and rebooted.  The problem started today and occurs as soon as Norton loads in the task manager.  There was no Norton program updates, so it was either a live update or something else Norton doesn't like in the last 24 hrs.

EDIT:  Adding I'm running Win10, still on 21H1 and my windows updates were paused a few days before patch Tuesday.  As other have mentioned that all signs are pointing towards Norton and I wonder it it has something to do with the SOFTWARE UPDATER?

Starting to look at alternatives after decades with Norton as it seems like things have become unbearable sing the crypto and and especially the Software updater forced on us

Folks ... please try the rapid opening and closing of the Norton interface to see if it works 

CPU22:

It's 110% Norton's problem. I wouldn't bother even responding to these suggestions because it's been verified independently now by several experienced users. We've never had anything like this happen in the last few years. It's either the norton update itself, or a windows update that has caused a conflict. 

And I have Windows Update Paused 

Indeed, on W10 21H2 a recent Norton Update is causing increased CPU utilization (bouncing from 3 - 18% with average ~6%) which, in turn, is causing mouse cursor icon to flash blue circle icon every 3-4 seconds. This is not caused by 2022-04 CU KB5012599 as uninstalling it does not resolve the issue.

I'm also noticing that after ~ 15 to 20 minutes my network starts continuously sending/receiving data and won't stop.  It appears to be Norton triggering the low bandwidth transfer ... is it trying to communicate with the servers?  I'll see NO network usage after a reboot, and then when Norton starts acting up, the network usage begins running in the background. 

This is a serious problem not only because of the waste of energy, but cannot, for example, rename a folder because CPU jumps cause cursor to flash, which erases folder name.

Any updates on this issue?  This could very well be one of the bigger bugs Norton has ever generated in years.  I've now helped a few relatives and friends who were also running into issues with their desktop icons or cursor spinning.  They were pulling their hair out and didn't even noticed the CPU usage.  Yes ... turns out it was also Norton causing the issue on their systems.  I think a lot of people may not know the root issue as this is also happening around Patch Tuesday.

Is anyone else also seeing seeing the network bandwidth bug as well.  It look like as soon as I hit my Norton 'idle time', Norton then decides to send/receive data at ~ 0.1Mbps non-stop.  I have the idle time optimizer turned off, but if I don't touch my system for 10 minutes Norton starts using my network.  If I check in the task manager on the processes tab, in the network column you can see Norton using a continuous 0.1 Mbps.  If I close out that process, it kills Norton.  When I restart Norton everything is good until my system is idle for 10 minutes, and then Norton start sending/receiving and chewing up bandwidth again ... don't know what it's communicating, but if you have ISP data limits this will very slowly chew at it.  This network bandwidth bug started along with the other issues.

One of my relatives confirmed that deleting Norton fixed the issue, but they are now without an anti-virus solution and they are also still getting re-install pop-ups from Norton after removing using Norton's own uninstall tool

I am also having this same problem as it seems many others are having as well. Has anyone confirmed that doing a reinstall using Norton's tool will fix the problem? I had been hoping by now that some of the members that have an in with Norton might have gotten a hint of a fix  or correction.

I tried uninstalling and reinstalling so that I knew I would have the current build, and it still does it. I have 3 Windows 10 Pro computers and all 3 are doing it. I uninstalled Norton and the problem went away. Using Windows Security for now and will give them a couple of days to fix it. If no fix, I'll probably try Bitdefender and dump Norton. The fact that this has not already been fixed is unacceptable.

I just clicked on "Show Hidden Items" on my Window's Bottom Right Tool bar, then Right clicked on the Norton icon there, then chose "Turn on Silent Mode" (Duration: 1 Day).  That (Supposedly) stops Norton's background processes.. Either way, it stopped that "flashing blue circle icon every 3-4 seconds" thing.

It may only be a temporary fix until Norton gets this current mess fixed, but it worked on all of our computers here.

Just want to pile on here as I'm experiencing the same problem since yesterday, 4/13, and traced it to Norton like everyone else. Opening and closing the Norton program seemed to work for a while yesterday, but not consistently. I also uninstalled and reinstalled the program, which did nothing. As someone else said, whatever is happening is intermittent and involves Norton repeatedly starting a new Windows process under my user name, for a total of three processes: one for system, and two for my user name, one of which flickers on and off every 1-2 seconds. But then it goes away for a while.... Then mysteriously comes back.

Whatever this is is hogging my system, hijacking my mouse cursor, and making me think very seriously about this being my final Norton subscription cycle after many years....

After some further testing this behavior might actually be related to the new software updater feature (which is useless and unwanted, by the way -- please get rid of it). I just had a prolonged spell of the flickering problem and tried a few more things to solve it. One of those was to force a software updater scan, let it run, and hit finish (but not allow it do any updates). Then I closed out of the Norton interface, and the flickering Windows process stopped and left me with three stable instances of NortonSecurity.exe. After a few minutes, the third stable process went away and has not resumed flickering (yet). Now I just have the two usual processes I would expect to see there (one for system and one for my user name).

It goes without saying there should be an option to completely disable/opt out of the software updater. I never asked for that and do not want it on my system.

Remember that we're actually unwilling beta testers.  When no one wanted the Software Updater, the official Norton stance was that they released the Updater to selected customers without permission and instead of removing it, they wanted our feedback.  Even after the feedback was to get rid of it, they just want to gather more feedback and try tweaking it.  I figure some project manager's metric was to launch the Updater meaning delaying the rollout or removing it isn't even on the table.

This new major issue is probably more of the same.  Some change under the hood that we are unwillingly testing.  Instead of Norton replying, they're probably reading these threads and 'gathering feedback'.

Well, the process open Norton then close it immediately used to work. Today, no luck. I turned on Norton's silent mode and the flashing continued. I then tried the open and immediately close Norton and it's working--for now.

A year or two ago my home theater computer stopped recording over-the-air programs. It took me a couple of days to realize Norton didn't know the difference between a web camera and a tuner. Norton installed and enabled a "feature" to help me. It kept telling me that it blocked a web camera, which the system doesn't have. It blocked my tuner instead.

I'm switching to Windows Defender and Malwarebytes. Now, does anyone know how to tell Norton to stop offering to reinstall itself after I supposedly completely removed it?

Steve

Like others here, at first thought I had a virus. But after investigating, I found it was Norton interacting with Microsoft gaming services every second or so. Even worse, Norton is continually writing to a log as a result which is destroying our SSD/NVMe drives!

The "Actor" is "Microsoft.gamingservices.exe".

The flashing some of you are seeing occurs when Norton performs a block. If you try to kill gaming services in task manager, it starts right up again. Norton won't skip a beat.

This started on April 14 for me after my computer had been running for hours. It's unrelated to Patch Tuesday since I didn't observe the same behavior yesterday. Norton needs to fix this ASAP before it kills my boot drive (watch your disk writes).  I had to stop doing my Federal and State taxes to try and fix this - great timing. My thoughts are that live update sent a bad one down the pipe.

By the way, I'm on Win 10 Pro 21H2 Build 19044.1645

Hi,

Thank you for reporting this issue on the Norton Community. We apologise for the inconvenience caused. We are currently investigating this issue. 

I have sent each of you private messages requesting logs. If you're able to collect logs, please upload them to this forum thread. Also, if you're available for a Remote session, please let us know. Thank you. 

There is a post from steve7890 under that gives a possible/probible fix that sounds like it may do the job. As a side note, I fired up my laptop, an HP running windows 11 and I installed all of the pending updates that I was afraid to do yesterday because of what was happening on my windows 10 desktop. So far there have not been the same problems on my laptop. I have not seen anyone really address what version of windows they are running. Could this be a part of the problem? Also, I am wondering what would happen if I were to downgrade from norton 360 to norton internet security. Just random thoughts on my part. No tech abilities to speak of, I am in awe of all of you.  

Re: Norton, you have a CPU racing and disk activity issue that is over 24 hours old. Are you aware of this and are you fixing it? (Posted: 14-Apr-2022 | 4:19PM)

It's encouraging to see that the Norton folks are now investigating this issue.  Hopefully they can get some decent log files.  I'm currently away from my home computer that has Norton, but for some additional observations when I was last using it ...

The cpu / resource bug seems to act like a 'sleeping baby' ...  If you're able to stop it temporarily, any sort of activity that triggers Norton can wake up the bug again.  This could be various Norton background tasks, auto live update, scanning downloads ... you have to be very careful not to wake the baby.

This may be why 'silent mode' could be helping a bit.  What I've noticed is that you can turn on silent mode, and then open/close cycle the Norton interface to stop the CPU bug.  With silent mode on, background activity is minimized so your chances of triggering the bug are greatly reduced.  I've still had some other sort of Norton activity trigger the CPU issue while Silent Mode was on, but it occurred much less frequently.

From what many of us have found, this CPU bug seems tied to an instance of Norton that is rapidly starting and stopping repeatedly as can be viewed in the task manager.  This instance can be triggered by any number of events, so it would seem the focus may not be on what the trigger is, but instead what the Norton instance is trying to perform and why does it keep cycling?

It's very simple, something is not right if the program tries to replicate itself and goes on a continuous process. The answer is not for every single user to reinstall and install. Please issue a new version and or patch.

If you run Norton update on the system not exhibiting the behavior, and apply the update, I expect the issue will occur. I did not see it on any of my systems until I ran update and applied it. 

If you run Norton update on the system not exhibiting the behavior, and apply the update, I expect the issue will occur. I did not see it on any of my systems until I ran update and applied it.

I run Norton update at least every morning on both machines; only one exhibits this behavior.   Also: I have not applied the MS April 2022 updates, so I rather doubt that is part of the problem.

Thank you Norton. Apparently a hot fix was applied automatically as the problem spontaneously stopped on all of my computers just a short while ago. Phew. Much better.