\’at.exe process is related to a malicious program that can properly be recognized as a coin miner trojan virus. That malware form uses your hardware to mine cryptocurrencies, basically – Monero or DarkCoin1. It makes your system roughly unusable due to high CPU usage.
What is \’at.exe process?
\’at.exe is a malicious process created by coin miner virus
\’at.exe – Really high CPU and GPU use
Besides CPU consumption, some of the coin miners additionally use GPU power for their tasks. In that case, you will probably struggle even to see the mouse arrow moving – GPU is usually used on 100%. It is not as vital as CPU for system work, so \’at.exe coin miner viruses do not waste time on trifles and use it all. It often can lead to unhappy effects.
Shortly about cryptocurrency mining
List of the typical coin miner symptoms
How dangerous is the \’at.exe miner?
Coin miners does not deal damage to your files. However, they make a lot of unpleasant things with the whole system
Firstly, \’at.exe virus makes your PC overloaded. It is not able to run your applications anymore, as all processor power is consumed by a malware. That malware does not care for your needs, all it focuses on is generating income on you. Even if you are patient, and you waited until web browser is open, you will likely experience extremely sluggish performance. Pages can open for years, any type of logins will likely take about a minute – just a headache for a person that does a job online.
\’at.exe Technical Summary.
| File Name | \’at.exe |
| Type | Trojan Coin Miner |
| Detection Name | Trojan:Win32/CoinMiner |
| Distribution Method | Software bundling, Intrusive advertisement, redirects to shady sites etc. |
| Similar behavior | Assignedaccessguard.exe, Appvnice.exe, Appvdllsurrogate.exe |
| Removal | Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware for automatic \’at.exe removal. |
“Visible” damage is not a single negative activity coin miners do to your PC. \’at.exe coin miner also deals damage to your OS. To execute all malevolent functions properly, it wrecks the protection components of your system. You will likely see your Microsoft Defender disabled – malware halts it to avoid detection. If you check the HOSTS file, you will likely see a load of new entries – they are added by this coin miner to connect your computer to a malicious cryptomining network. All these changes shall be thrown back to the original in the process of computer recovery.
Hardware effects of coin miner activity
Besides decreasing your PC’s performance, running at peak level for long times may cause damage to your device and increase power expenses. Hardware elements are designed to easily get along with high load, but they are good with it only in case when they are in a good shape.
Small and well-protected CPU fan is quite hard to damage. Meanwhile, GPUs have large and easy-to-access rotors, which can be easily broke if touched while working, for example, by the user much earlier before the virus injection. Malfunctioning cooling system, together with the really high load caused by \’at.exe virus can easily lead to graphic processing unit failure3. GPUs are also tend to have increased wearing when utilized for cryptocurrency mining. It is surely an unwanted situation when the performance of your graphic card decreases on 20-30% only after 1-2 weeks of being exploited in such a way.
How did I get \’at.exe coin miner virus?
Coin miners are spread through different ways, but their main sources are malicious banners and programs from dubious sources
The example of malicious banners you can see in the Internet
Another way you could get this thing on your computer is by downloading it from the dubious website as a part of a program. Users who spread hacked variants of well-known programs (which do not demand the license key) have small chances to make money. Thus, there is a very big lure to include malware to the final package of the hacked app and acquire a coin for each installation. Before blaming these individuals for hacking and malware distribution, ask yourself – is it alright to avoid buying the program in this manner? It is much cheaper to pay $20-$30 one time than to pay a much greater figure for antivirus software and new parts for your computer.
How to remove the \’at.exe miner from my PC?
The best way to get rid of this coin miner virus is to use anti-malware software
Booting the PC into Safe Mode with Networking
Press the Start button, then choose Power, and click on Reboot while holding the Shift key on the keyboard.
Windows will reboot into recovery mode. In that mode, choose Troubleshoot→ Startup Settings→ Safe Mode with Networking. Press the corresponding button on your keyboard to choose that option.
When your computer is in Safe Mode, all third-party apps, along with the majority of non-crucial system components, are not launched with the system start. That allows you to clean the computer without dealing with high CPU usage of the coin miner.
References
- Read about why Monero and DarkCoin are so popular amongst cybercriminals.
- About unwanted effects for GPUs in the process of cryptomining.
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