How to protect a USB from files being deleted by antivirus on any number of computers?

I have a work flash drive that I carry around a lot of places to give presentations. It connects to a wide range of desktops, laptops, projectors, and smartTVs. There is a common antivirus used in this country, Smadav (free version). To make navigating my flash drive easier, I've made links from one folder to another. But anytime I do this, Smadav deletes them within a few seconds. This happens whether I link to a document in another folder (such as a powerpoint I created from scratch) or another folder. The free version doesn't allow you to create exceptions or restore quarantined files. I al

Question by Bradley Rhodes on Super User, licensed CC BY-SA. We show a short excerpt and link to the original thread as credit.