Uninstalling NIS with Norton Removal Tool breaks Windows Update

I recently uninstalled Norton Internet Security 2015 using the Norton Removal Tool. Following the successful uninstall, I noticed that Windows Update stopped working.

After some research, I have concluded that the cause of the problem is a missing registry key caused by the Norton Removal Tool process. I have duplicated the issue with the steps below as this information may be helpful to include in this knowledge-base. I believe this is a bug in the Norton Removal Tool.

1) Open regedit and navigate to the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\BackupRestore

The BackupRestore branch should contain the following three keys:

FilesNotToBackup

FilesNotToSnapshot

KeysNotToRestore


2) On the PC running Norton Internet Security, download and run the Norton Removal Tool to uninstall Norton Internet Security.

3) Open regedit and navigate to the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\BackupRestore

The BackupRestore branch now contains NO keys.

The Microsoft Windows Update utility requires the FilesNotToBackup key in order to run correctly and for the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) service to start and run.

Simply adding the FilesNotToBackup key under the BackupRestore branch will allow Windows to write critical information to the FilesNotToBackup key and will correct the Windows Update error code is 80246008.