[FIXED] Pyinstaller says I made a virus

Issue

I made a game in pygame called Balls to the Walls and I encounter an error when building the program in pyinstaller. I run: C:\Users\Ben pyinstaller --windowed --icon=logo.ico BallsWalls.py The output is:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<frozen runpy>", line 198, in _run_module_as_main
  File "<frozen runpy>", line 88, in _run_code
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Scripts\pyinstaller.exe\__main__.py", line 7, in <module>
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\__main__.py", line 205, in _console_script_run
    run()
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\__main__.py", line 189, in run
    run_build(pyi_config, spec_file, **vars(args))
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\__main__.py", line 61, in run_build
    PyInstaller.building.build_main.main(pyi_config, spec_file, **kwargs)
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\build_main.py", line 1033, in main
    build(specfile, distpath, workpath, clean_build)
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\build_main.py", line 973, in build
    exec(code, spec_namespace)
  File "C:\Users\Student\Balls to the Walls\BallsWalls.spec", line 18, in <module>
    exe = EXE(
          ^^^^
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\api.py", line 625, in __init__
    self.__postinit__()
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\datastruct.py", line 184, in __postinit__
    self.assemble()
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\api.py", line 738, in assemble
    self._retry_operation(icon.CopyIcons, build_name, self.icon)
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\building\api.py", line 992, in _retry_operation
    return func(*args)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\utils\win32\icon.py", line 209, in CopyIcons
    return CopyIcons_FromIco(dstpath, [srcpath])
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\PyInstaller\utils\win32\icon.py", line 143, in CopyIcons_FromIco
    hdst = win32api.BeginUpdateResource(dstpath, 0)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\win32ctypes\pywin32\win32api.py", line 208, in BeginUpdateResource
    with _pywin32error():
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\contextlib.py", line 155, in __exit__
    self.gen.throw(typ, value, traceback)
  File "B:\Python Installs\Python 3.11.6\Lib\site-packages\win32ctypes\pywin32\pywintypes.py", line 37, in pywin32error
    raise error(exception.winerror, exception.function, exception.strerror)
win32ctypes.pywin32.pywintypes.error: (225, 'BeginUpdateResourceW', 'Operation did not complete successfully because the file contains a virus or potentially unwanted software.')

Any way to fix this at all? I tried other questions and they don't work, so don't flag this as duplicate. This question does not ask multiple questions. It only asks one.

Solution

Make sure you're developing in a folder that your antivirus has been told to ignore.

Microsoft's documentation suggests the following steps on Windows 11:

1. Open Start -> Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Virus & threat protection
2. Select "manage settings", go to "exclusions", and click "add or remove exclusions".
3. Select "Add an exclusion", then select a directory that contains the development work where you don't want Windows Defender interfering with pyinstaller.

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You can also temporarily disable the antivirus as a whole.

Answered By - Charles Duffy