---
title: "How to Install Virus Scanner in cPanel – ClamAV"
description: "In this article, we'll discuss how you can install and configure the ClamAV plugin for cPanel. ClamAV is a popular open-source anti-virus scanner and with the ClamAV plugin, you can allow your cPanel..."
url: https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/edu/cpanel/install-and-configure-clamav/
date: 2012-11-15
modified: 2022-12-20
author: "InMotion Hosting Contributor"
categories: ["cPanel"]
type: post
lang: en
---

# How to Install Virus Scanner in cPanel – ClamAV

In this article, we’ll discuss how you can install and configure the ClamAV plugin for cPanel. ClamAV is a popular open-source anti-virus scanner and with the ClamAV plugin, you can allow your cPanel users to scan their e-mails as well as scan their home directories for malicious files.

Getting this installed yourself would require [root access](/support/server/ssh/root-access-faq/) on either your VPS (Virtual Private Server) or dedicated server, or you can contact support to have us install the ClamAV anti-virus plugin for you for a $25 installation fee. You can follow the steps below to learn how to install virus scanner in cPanel and scan your site.

![How to Install and Configure ClamAV in WHM](https://i.ytimg.com/vi_webp/IarWF-41FZE/maxresdefault.webp)

*Don’t have time to read the full article? Watch our walk-through video.*

## Install and configure ClamAV plugin in WHM

1. [Log into WHM as the root user](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/edu/whm/log-into-whm/#root).
2. In the top-left **Find** box, type in **plugins**, then click on **Manage Plugins**.![Access the Plugin Manager in WHM](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav-manage-plugins.png)
3. Click the **Install ClamAV for cPanel** button.![Install ClamAV for cPanel](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav.png)The installation process can take a good amount of time, upwards of 10 minutes, so be patient and don’t close the web browser until it completes. When it finishes you’ll see a *“ClamAV for cPanel” is now installed* message at the bottom of the screen.![ClamAV is Now Installed](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Selection_1620.png)
4. Log out, and then[ back into WHM as the root user](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/edu/whm/log-into-whm/#root) again.
5. In the top-left *search* box, type in **clamav**, then click on **Configure ClamAV Scanner**.![Access ClamAV Configuration](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav-configure.png)
6. Now you can set the global scan permissions you’d like to set. If you’d simply like to allow any cPanel user to scan any of their stuff you can place a check beside **Scan Entire Home Directory**, **Scan Mail**, **Scan Public FTP Space**, and **Scan Public Web Space**, then click on **Save**.![Saving ClamAV Scanner Configuration](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav-configure-save.png)

## Run ClamAV Virus Scan From cPanel

1. Now [login to your cPanel](/support/edu/cpanel/how-to-log-into-cpanel/) to use the virus scanner.
2. Under the **Advanced** section, click on **Virus Scanner**.![ClamAV cPanel Virus Scanner](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav-cpanel-virus-scanner.png)
3. Now to start a new scan, select the type of scan you want, in this example we’re doing **Scan Entire Home Directory**, then click on **Scan Now**.![ClamAV Virus Scanner - Scan Now](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/install-clamav-cpanel-scan-now.png)
4. After the scan is complete there will be a list of infected files in the Infected Files: section, click OK on the confirmation window that pops up to continue.
5. In my test, all 3 of the files that were found are coming up for known variants of a PHP mailer or PHP shell, so we can just leave the selections in the **Quarantine** column to place these files outside of our **/public_html** directory so they are not still accessible to the outside world. We could also just outright **Destroy** them, or **Ignore** them by changing our selection to those columns. Then simply click on **Process Cleanup**. You should then see the cleanup process complete page.
6. Now if you use cPanel’s [File Manager](/support/edu/cpanel/using-file-manager-in-cpanel/) you can navigate to the newly created **quarantine_clamavconnector** directory in your home directory to see the quarantined files.

## Run ClamAV Scan From Console (SSH)

1. [Login to your server via SSH](/support/server/ssh/how-to-login-ssh/).
2. Run the following command to scan the entire **/home/userna5/public_html** directory:clamscan -ri /home/userna5/public_html The **r** flag is for recursive, and the **i** flag is to only show infected files. You should end up with a listing of any infected files that were found such as: `/home/userna5/public_html/uploads/mail.php: PHP.Mailer-7 FOUND /home/userna5/public_html/uploads/sh.php: PHP.C99-13 FOUND /home/userna5/public_html/uploads/view.php: PHP.C99-13 FOUND ----------- SCAN SUMMARY ----------- Known viruses: 1324142 Engine version: 0.97.6 Scanned directories: 4979 Scanned files: 13835 Infected files: 3 Data scanned: 583.20 MB Data read: 1193.90 MB (ratio 0.49:1) Time: 372.032 sec (6 m 12 s)`
3. To see all of the options available to you for the **clamscan** command append the **–help** flag. clamscan --help

You should now understand how to install and configure the ClamAV plugin for cPanel to help protect your accounts against virus threats.