Brendan Smith

Brendan Smith has spent over 15 years knee-deep in cybersecurity, chasing down malware from the gritty reverse-engineering of old-school trojans all the way to wrangling full-blown incident responses for small-to-medium businesses that couldn’t afford a full-blown breach. Over at Gridinsoft, he’s the guy piecing together those double-checked guides on nasty stuff like AsyncRAT, a remote access tool used in malware campaigns—helping readers make sense of the threat and work through cleanup without the extra headache.
Cybersecurity Analyst
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783 Articles

WinRing0x64.sys Defender Alert: Safe Driver or Malware?

A practical check for WinRing0x64.sys: legitimate hardware utility, Microsoft vulnerable driver alert,…

Brendan Smith

Program:Win32/Wacapew.C!ml: False Positive or Remove?

Defender detected Program:Win32/Wacapew.C!ml? Learn how to check the file source, decide whether…

Brendan Smith

MsMpEng.exe High CPU Fix

Antimalware Service Executable using high CPU, memory, or disk? Learn safe MsMpEng.exe…

Brendan Smith

RegAsm.exe: Safe or Malware?

RegAsm.exe is a legitimate Microsoft .NET tool, but malware can imitate or…

Brendan Smith

HxTsr.exe: Safe Microsoft Process, High CPU, or Error?

HxTsr.exe usually belongs to legacy Microsoft Mail and Calendar. Check the installed…

Brendan Smith

Sniffing vs Spoofing

Learn the difference between sniffing and spoofing, how attackers use traffic capture…

Brendan Smith

csrss.exe: Safe Windows Process or Trojan Virus?

csrss.exe is normally safe in C:\Windows\System32. Verify the path and signature, recognize…

Brendan Smith

What Is UsoClient.exe? Safe or Virus?

UsoClient.exe is a legitimate Windows Update component when it runs from C:\Windows\System32…

Brendan Smith

SASE vs Zero Trust: Differences and When to Use Each

SASE is the cloud delivery architecture; Zero Trust is the access model.…

Brendan Smith

Password Stealer Malware: What to Do After Infection

Password stealer malware can steal passwords, cookies, tokens, wallets, and autofill data.…

Brendan Smith

Trojan:Win32/Vigorf.A: Remove It or False Positive?

Defender flagged Trojan:Win32/Vigorf.A? Check the file, FanControl driver version, Dell recovery path…

Brendan Smith

How to Protect Personal Data From Scams and Account Takeover

Personal data can fuel phishing, impersonation, SIM swap, identity theft, and account…

Brendan Smith

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