Qasek.exe process belongs to a malevolent program that can correctly be defined as a coin miner trojan virus. That malware type utilizes your hardware to mine cryptocurrencies, primarily – Monero or DarkCoin1. It makes your computer almost nonfunctional as a result of high CPU usage.
What is Qasek.exe process?
Qasek.exe is a malicious process created by coin miner virus
Qasek.exe – Very high CPU/GPU usage
Besides CPU utilization, some of the coin miners additionally utilize GPU power for their tasks. In that situation, you will struggle also to see the mouse arrow moving – GPU is often utilized on 100%. It is not as essential as processor for system work, so Qasek.exe coin miner viruses don’t waste time on trifles and utilize it all. It often can lead to bad consequences.
Shortly about cryptocurrency mining
List of the typical coin miner symptoms
How dangerous is the Qasek.exe miner?
Coin miners does not deal damage to your files. However, they make a lot of unpleasant things with the whole system
First, Qasek.exe virus makes your computer overloaded. It is unable to run your applications anymore, because all processor power is used by a virus. That malware does not care for your wants, 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 incredibly slow efficiency. Pages can open for years, any sort of logins will take about a minute – just a horror story for a person that works online.
Qasek.exe Technical Summary.
| File Name | Qasek.exe |
| Type | Trojan Coin Miner |
| Detection Name | Trojan:Win32/CoinMiner |
| Distribution Method | Software bundling, Intrusive advertisement, redirects to shady sites etc. |
| Similar behavior | Dhcpsvchostdllcommon.exe, Microsoftconhost.exe, Temp.working |
| Removal | Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware for automatic Qasek.exe removal. |
“Visible” damage is not a solitary negative activity coin miners perform to your personal computer. Qasek.exe coin miner likewise deals damage to your operating system. To execute all malicious operations properly, it wrecks the security features of your system. You will likely see your Microsoft Defender disabled – malware halts it to prevent detection. If you check the HOSTS file, you will likely see a number of new entries – they are added by this trojan miner to connect your computer to a malicious cryptomining network. All these changes shall be gone 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 power for long times can cause damage to your device as well as increase power bills. Hardware components are designed to easily deal with high load, but they are good with it only when they are in a good shape.
Compact and covered processor cooling system is not very easy to damage. Meanwhile, graphic cards have big and easy-to-access fans, which can be easily broke if affected while running, for example, by the user much before the coin-miner injection. Malfunctioning cooling system, together with the extremely high load caused by Qasek.exe virus can easily lead to graphic card failure3. Video cards are also prone to have fast wearing when used for cryptocurrency mining. It is surely a bad case when your GPU’s performance decreases on 20-30% only after several weeks of being used in such a way.
How did I get Qasek.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 item on your computer is by downloading it from the dubious web page as a part of a program. Users that spread hacked variants of well-known programs (which do not require the license key) have small chances to make money. Hence, there is a huge lure to include malware to the final package of the hacked app and acquire a coin for every installation. Before criticizing these people for hacking and also malware spreading, ask yourself – is it OK to avoid paying for the program in this manner? It is much cheaper to pay $20-$30 one time than to pay a much greater sum for antivirus program and new parts for your desktop.
How to remove the Qasek.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 applications, just like the majority of non-critical Windows components, are not started with the system start. That allows you to clean the system 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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