Patent ID: 8387147

Claim:
A method for detecting a potential hidden pestware file on a storage device of a computer, the method comprising: detecting, using direct drive access, a file on the storage device, the direct drive access bypassing a standard file Application-Program-Interface (API) function call of an operating system of the computer; determining whether the file is detectable by the operating system by attempting to access the file using the standard file API function call of the operating system, the file being detectable by the operating system when the attempt to access the file using the standard file API function call is successful, the file being undetectable by the operating system when the attempt to access the file using the standard file API function call is unsuccessful; identifying the file as a potential hidden pestware file, when the file is undetectable by the operating system; and performing the following when the file has been identified as the potential hidden pestware file: notifying a user that the file is the potential hidden pestware file; presenting to the user an option to remove automatically the potential hidden pestware file from the storage device; and removing, using direct drive access, the potential hidden pestware file from the storage device automatically in response to an input from the user.