diff --git a/debian/security-misc.config b/debian/security-misc.config
index 71726a4..95684bc 100644
--- a/debian/security-misc.config
+++ b/debian/security-misc.config
@@ -22,6 +22,8 @@ true "
 "
 
 check_migrate_permission_hardener_state() {
+   local modified_pkg_data_str custom_hardening_arr config_file
+
    ## If folder /var/lib/permission-hardener (version 1) does not exist, this migration is unneeded.
    if [ ! -d '/var/lib/permission-hardener' ]; then
       return 0
@@ -82,7 +84,10 @@ check_migrate_permission_hardener_state() {
       '/etc/permission-hardener.d/30_default.conf'
    )
 
-   readarray -t custom_hardening_arr < <(dpkg -V | awk '/permission-hardener.d/{ print $NF }')
+   ## This will exit non-zero if some of the packages don't exist, but we
+   ## don't care. The packages that *are* installed will still be scanned.
+   modified_pkg_data_str="$(dpkg -V security-misc user-sysmaint-split anon-apps-config)" || true
+   readarray -t custom_hardening_arr < <(awk '/permission-hardener.d/{ print $NF }' <<< "${modified_pkg_data_str}")
    ## If the above `dpkg -V` command doesn't return any permission-hardener
    ## related lines, the array will contain no meaningful info, just a single
    ## blank element at the start. Set the array to be explicitly empty in