J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

When I start Windows, I get a popup box

Windows Defender

(i) This program is turned off

If you are using another program that checks for harmful or
unwanted
software, use the Action Center to check that program's status.

If I open the Action Center, I just see two (orange) sections: one
telling me "Windows Update is set to check with you before downloading
and installing updates.", which I have no intention of changing!, and
one telling me "Your files are not being backed up.", which just means I
don't have an _automatic_ backup in place.

There is no mention of AVG at all.

I'm sure I've seen Action Center acknowledge, and reflect the settings
of, AVG before now. (AVG's icon is in the tray, _without_ a yellow
triangle on it; if I click on it, it comes up and tells me "You have
basic protection", and "Virus definition: 3 hours ago".

So how do I remind Action Center that I have a working and up-to-date
copy of AVG? (Do I have to do something from within AVG?)

Action Center - Change Action Center settings

There you can decide which alerts to enable or disable. My AV program
(Avast) takes care of the registry settings to register it as the
alternative to Defender; else, I'd have to use the Action Center
settings to disable its alerts regarding "Virus protection" (and perhaps
"Spyware and related protection", too).

Avast acquired AVG in 2016 so there's no point in sticking with AVG
anymore. In fact, soon after the acquisition, Avast modified AVG to add
their spam signature, by default, if you installed the mail shield.
Avast wanted to use their new acquisition to spam via Usenet and e-mail
like they do in their own-brand AV program.

https://press.avast.com/avast-announ...re-avg-for-13b