Fingerprint sensor not working after updating to windows 10 1903. (Dell G3 3579)

After installing Windows 10 v1903, did you let it get all updates?

You have registry contamination and possibly malware.

Drivers for USB as well as chipset etc are not loaded.

This device is not working properly because Windows cannot load the drivers required for this device. (Code 31)

Time for clean install starting with 1903 and then all the drivers one at a time via Adminstrator account.

The Reader is not being physically found due to drivers not passing certificate checksums so they are not allowed to load.

@nyc10036I have a freshly installed windows, I'm also using Malwarebytes, because of I also manually compared & checked all registry items, the registry is fine, there shouldn'y be a malware causing this obstruction, I believe its a hardware driver, compatability issue with new 1903 update, and either the microsoft or the goodix company, or most importantly dell should issue a patch for this.

Windows 10 has its own anti-virus.

What I would do is to do another clean installation of Windows 10.

Disconnect from internet when you are doing this.

Remain disconnected and install chipset driver from Dell website that you had downloaded previously onto a USB flash drive.

Reconnect to Internet by Ethernet cable and let Windows 10 update.

In the twenty or more times that I have installed Windows 10, I have never never never been contaminated by malware during the installation.

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Rootkits and malware that hide in the partition table or uefi or msr will survive format and reinstall. Malwarebytes wont find this as well.

Rootkit-based malware has been around for years and recently infects the Windows 10 platform, with a major change: It uses a digitally signed driver to bypass Windows 10 protections. Rootkits embedded in a device’s firmware can be more difficult to recover from and clean up. Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) rootkits like APT28 was the first UEFI rootkit found in the wild. The rootkit was embedded in the flash memory of a device’s Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI). That gave the rootkit persistence against both reinstallation of the operating system and replacement of the hard drive. Protecting against UEFI infection is possible by enabling the Secure Boot mechanism, which checks that every component and driver loaded by the system is signed with a valid certificate.  Unfortunately when you have drivers that are infected windows will prevent these drivers from loading.

physical corruption,  certificate revocation,  malware and other things will cause files to fail validation.  ELAM will not allow these files/drivers/etc to load EVER.

Windows no longer allows bypass of WHQL certificate checks.

This is why realtek audio drivers get borked all the time now.

The other vector of course is infection in legit installers so that when you go to install the driver you downloaded the malware has already infected the driver and its installer.

Once you are infected in this way does not matter how many times you reinstall you are still infected.

This is proved to my clients all the time by OFFLINE installs onto brand new never before used hard drives.

Then the machine is put online via cellular wireless connection with a local account and no microsoft account.

Once activated it is placed back on the clients network behind a physical firewall.

All windows updates and drivers etc are installed and then the machine is tested.

Everything passes.  We then physically remove the drive and put the clients infected drive back and show them it not working.

I am very interested on how you came to the conclusion it was malware. From which analysis?

After updating windows 10 to Nov 2019 release my fingerprint scanner stopped working. i am at the moment at insider preview 19013.

This thread is interesting. Are you guys saying a rootkit. deep inside bios disabled the fingerprint scanner.

You have registry contamination and possibly malware.

Drivers for USB as well as chipset etc are not loaded.

This device is not working properly because Windows cannot load the drivers required for this device. (Code 31)

When the Code 31 error occurs in device(s), then the corresponding device appears with a yellow exclamation mark sign, next to it, in Device Manager.

Just because signature scans do not find malware does not mean malware doesn't exist on the machine.

Just because you reformat hard drive and or replace hard drive does not mean that the malware was removed.  Especially if user files are put back.

Malware can hide in files and partitions and roms and usb flash drives and drives other than the hard drive including network drives.

Drivers not loading are due to certificate failure and or ELAM detecting invalid drivers based on certificates and catalog files.

Some vendors certificates are revoked because they are found to have been compromised by malware. Early Launch Anti-Malware (ELAM) is a Windows security technology that evaluates device and application drivers for malicious code. Fingerprint reader has both App as well as Driver.

Hi,

I hope you're doing good.

I haven't heard from you in a while.

I will go ahead and archive this case for now. Feel free to reach out if you have any concerns.

Here is the reference number 42926041 for our conversation.

Regards,

Gopal

first person who told me something actually useful on this forum, thankyou
@speedstep Any idea how I should go about fixing it... I've updated & clean installed windows..its still not working..