Hello,
Thanks for the feedback. One solution for the high file count and scan time limit being exceeded is to adjust the maximum execution time as this has fixed the problem before.
Go to the Wordfence Tools page, click the Diagnostics tab, and scroll to the bottom of the page.
Click the link to view your system’s configuration.
Look for the value for max_execution_time
Set the “Maximum execution time for each scan stage” in the Options page to about 80% of the value for max_execution_time that you found above. So if it’s 90, try setting the option to 75.
Try another scan and see if that solves the problem.
One other possible reason for the incorrect high file count and scan time limit being exceeded is that you may have one or more symlinks in your document root which can cause a loop.
A symlink, if you don’t know, may appear to be a directory in your website file-system but it doesn’t contain any files. Instead its purpose is to link to another file or directory, like a shortcut on Windows or an alias on a Mac.
Let me give you an example. Let’s say you have a symlink called www in your document root ( e.g. public_html/www ) and its purpose is to link to your public_html directory. Wordfence can get caught in a loop following this symlink and keeping a track of the file count in your public_html folder as it goes around this loop. Eventually the scan can exceed the scan time limit.
Can you check for me if you have any apparent symlinks in your website document root file-system.
If so you you can add any symlink’s name, or the path of any symlink’s name, to the field “Exclude files from scan that match these wildcard patterns” on the Wordfence Options page. You may find enabling debugging helpful and send a detailed log.
1. Go to the Diagnostics page and turn on “Enable debugging mode” near the bottom of the page
2. Run a scan manually
3. When the scan has finished (even if it stops early), click the link “Email activity log” above the Scan Detailed Activity box, and then click the Send button
4. Then turn off the debugging mode option again on the Diagnostics page, for best performance.
