Ecco.exe process is related to a malevolent program that can accurately be defined as a coin miner trojan. That malware type utilizes your hardware to mine cryptocurrencies, primarily – Monero or DarkCoin1. It makes your computer roughly nonfunctional because of high CPU utilization.
What is Ecco.exe process?
Ecco.exe is a malicious process created by coin miner virus
Ecco.exe – Really high CPU as well as GPU usage
Besides CPU consumption, some of the coin miners additionally utilize GPU power for their tasks. In that situation, you will likely struggle also to see the mouse arrow moving – GPU is often utilized on 100%. It is not as important as CPU for system work, so Ecco.exe coin miner viruses don’t waste time on trifles and use all of it. It often may cause unhappy consequences.
Shortly about cryptocurrency mining
List of the typical coin miner symptoms
How dangerous is the Ecco.exe miner?
Coin miners does not deal damage to your files. However, they make a lot of unpleasant things with the whole system
Initially, Ecco.exe malware makes your PC overloaded. It is not able to run your applications now, since all CPU power is consumed by a malware. That malware does not care for your necessities, all it focuses on is making money on you. Even if you are patient, and you waited until web browser is open, you will likely suffer from extremely slow efficiency. Pages will open for years, any type of logins will take about a minute – just a headache for a person that does a job online.
Ecco.exe Technical Summary.
| File Name | Ecco.exe |
| Type | Trojan Coin Miner |
| Detection Name | Trojan:Win32/CoinMiner |
| Distribution Method | Software bundling, Intrusive advertisement, redirects to shady sites etc. |
| Similar behavior | Yandex.exe, Spotifai.exe, Netdnsd.exe |
| Removal | Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware for automatic Ecco.exe removal. |
“Visible” damage is not a solitary negative activity coin miners perform to your PC. Ecco.exe coin miner also deals damage to your OS. To complete all malevolent functions effectively, it ruins the security components of your system. You will likely see your Microsoft Defender disabled – malware halts it to avoid recognition. If you check the HOSTS file, you will likely see a ton of new entries – they are added by this trojan miner to connect your system to a malicious cryptomining network. All these adjustments shall be reverted to the initial state in the process of computer recovery.
Hardware effects of coin miner activity
Besides slowing down your PC, performing at peak power for a long period of time can trigger damage to your device as well as increase electricity bills. PC components are created to easily get along with high load, but they can do so only in case when they are in a good shape.
Tiny and covered CPU fan is quite hard to broke. Meanwhile, graphic cards have big and easy-to-access fans, which can be easily broke if affected while spinning, for example, by the user much before the coin-miner injection. Malfunctioning cooling system, together with the extremely high load caused by Ecco.exe miner can easily lead to graphic processing unit failure3. Video cards are also tend to have fast wearing when used for crypto mining. It is likely an unwanted case when your GPU’s performance decreases on 20-30% just after several weeks of being exploited in such a way.
How did I get Ecco.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
An additional way you could get this thing on your computer is by downloading it from the unreliable web page as a part of a program. Users that spread hacked versions of well-known programs (which do not need the license key) have small chances to get paid. Therefore, there is a huge lure to add malware to the final package of the hacked app and get a coin for every setup. Prior to blaming these individuals for hacking and malware spreading, ask yourself – is it OK to avoid purchasing the program in such a way? It is much cheaper to pay $20-$30 at once than to pay a much greater figure for antivirus software and new parts for your PC.
How to remove the Ecco.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 system is in Safe Mode, all third-party programs, just like the majority of non-critical operating system components, are not started with the system start. That gives you the ability to clean the PC without dealing with high processor 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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