Hfhelper32.exe process belongs to a malevolent program that can accurately be recognized as a coin miner trojan virus. That malware type uses your hardware to mine cryptocurrencies, primarily – Monero or DarkCoin1. It makes your system roughly nonfunctional as a result of high CPU use.
What is Hfhelper32.exe process?
Hfhelper32.exe is a malicious process created by coin miner virus
Hfhelper32.exe – Very high CPU as well as GPU use
Besides CPU utilization, some of the coin miners additionally utilize GPU power for their operations. In that case, you will likely struggle even to see the mouse cursor moving – GPU is usually utilized on 100%. It is not as essential as processor for system work, so Hfhelper32.exe coin miner viruses do not waste time on trifles and use all of it. It often can cause unhappy results.
Shortly about cryptocurrency mining
List of the typical coin miner symptoms
How dangerous is the Hfhelper32.exe miner?
Coin miners does not deal damage to your files. However, they make a lot of unpleasant things with the whole system
First, Hfhelper32.exe virus makes your computer overloaded. It is unable to run your applications anymore, as all CPU power is consumed by a malware. That malware does not care for your wants, all it pays attention to is generating profits on you. Even if you are patient, and you waited until web browser is open, you will likely experience exceptionally slow performance. Pages will open up for years, any type of logins will take about a minute – just a horror story for a person who does a job online.
Hfhelper32.exe Technical Summary.
| File Name | Hfhelper32.exe |
| Type | Trojan Coin Miner |
| Detection Name | Trojan:Win32/CoinMiner |
| Distribution Method | Software bundling, Intrusive advertisement, redirects to shady sites etc. |
| Similar behavior | Ie4uinit.exe, Bdeunlock.exe, Bdehdcfg.exe |
| Removal | Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware for automatic Hfhelper32.exe removal. |
“Visible” damage is not a solitary bad thing coin miners perform to your personal computer. Hfhelper32.exe coin miner also deals damage to your OS. To carry out all malevolent functions properly, it wrecks the security features of your system. You will likely see your Microsoft Defender disabled – malware halts it to avoid detection. If you open the HOSTS file, you will likely see a ton of new entries – they are brought in by this coin miner to connect your PC to a malicious cryptomining network. All these adjustments shall be thrown back to the initial state in the process of PC recovery.
Hardware effects of coin miner activity
Besides decreasing your system’s performance, performing at peak level for long times can cause damage to your device and increase power expenses. Hardware elements are designed to easily deal with high load, but they are good with it only when they are in a good shape.
Small and well-protected CPU cooling system is quite hard to crack. Meanwhile, graphic cards have big and easy-to-access fans, which can be easily broke if affected while spinning, for instance, by the user much earlier before the malware injection. Malfunctioning cooling system, together with the really high load caused by Hfhelper32.exe malware can easily lead to graphic card failure3. Video cards are also prone to have very fast wearing when used for crypto mining. It is likely an undesirable situation when your GPU’s performance plunges 20-30% only after several weeks of being exploited in such a way.
How did I get Hfhelper32.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
One more way you could get this thing on your computer is by downloading it from the suspicious web page as a part of a program. Users that spread hacked versions of favored programs (which do not require the license key) have small chances to earn money. For this reason, there is a very big temptation to include malware to the final package of the hacked app and receive a coin for every installation. Prior to criticizing these individuals for hacking and malware spreading, ask yourself – is it OK to avoid buying the program in this manner? It is much cheaper to pay $20-$30 one time than to pay a much bigger figure for antivirus software as well as new parts for your desktop.
How to remove the Hfhelper32.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 software, just like the majority of non-crucial Windows components, are not started with the system start. That gives you the ability to clean the PC 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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