After Effects relinking missing files

Hi I thought I would see if anyone could help me with a problem I've been having with After Effects. Whenever I open up my AE file it says that my png's in the composition are missing so I go to relink them and find them on my hard drive and when I press 'locate' a warning message comes up saying  "After Effects warning: Alias: Invalid ascend count '0'." So I import the png files again into my project and relink them to the new import and it works then I close the file down and reopen it the next day and the same thing occurs. I am using a MacBook Pro (2021) and was wondering if it was a Macbook issue or an After Effects issue.