This process recently showed up in my task manager and I don’t recognize it and can’t find much info on it. A google search brings up 4 results–all German. Translation mentions something about a worm. Anyone heard of this?
Sophos has nothing specific, but if it is a worm, it may be a pseudo-random file name.
Do you have up-to-date antivirus software installed?
Yea I’ve updated NAV and did a full scan. The rough google translation of that German site made mention of a change from some other wmi*** name. Any ideas on what I should do?
Is it this? (from this site)
Wmiprvse WMIPrvSe.exe
(Microsoft) Windows Management Instrumentation Provider Service first introduced in Windows XP, and then in Windows 2003. WMIPRVSE is a host process for WMI provider services. It is a new Windows architecture intended to eliminate the previous problems in Windows 2000 where the failure of a WMI provider service would make the whole WMI service fail as, then, WMI provider services were loaded in-process with the WMI Service (a new request to WMI would restart the WMI Service). With the new WMIPRVSE model, failure of a single WMI provider service affects that service only rather than the entire WMI Service. For the layman : this is an essential Windows XP/2003 service which will start whenever a specific piece of software requires its facilities.
Recommendation :
Essential – leave alone. Note that, as with SVCHOST, there may be more than one instance of WMIPRVSE running in your Task List : this is normal. Also, some users will never have witnessed the WMIPRVSE service running on their Windows XP/2003 PC, and then notice it running one day and every day thereafter : this is also normal and will in most cases be the result of some software having been installed (and installing WMI provider services) or the result of a Windows Update. Finally, as with SVCHOST, if you experience errors or excess CPU usage with WMIPRVSE, the problem will in almost all cases be with the WMI provider process that WMIPRVSE is hosting, not with WMIPRVSE itself, or you may have a hardware problem or incompatibility which is not yet at the “serious” stage – see if Microsoft’s Windows Update has WMI related fixes for your PC/Server; also, on a network, we have empirical evidence that poor network card drivers or chipsets on any part of the network may result in excessive CPU usage by WMIPRVSE.
I guess that’s it. Strange that a google search didn’t bring up anything but obviously you found it somehow. The only problem is that GTA: Vice City keeps giving me a “not enough available memory” error, which I know isn’t true; I figured that the new mysterious process might have had something to do with it. Thanks for your help.