A website posing as the popular PC overclocking software MSI Afterburner lures users into downloading a program that can potentially cause serious harm to computers. The threat comes at a time when MSI's official program is unavailable, making it a tempting alternative to those desperate to get their hands on the renowned performance-boosting tool. MSI isn't just known for coming up with powerful gaming laptops, but for producing reliable software as well.
The MSI Afterburner application has been allowing gamers and enthusiasts alike to fine-tune and push their graphics cards well beyond their limits for over a decade now. Its diverse range of compatibility, which sees it work well across various GPUs regardless of the brand, along with its plethora of overclocking tools led to its rise in popularity. However, now that GPU shortages are expected to last even longer, more users are turning to overclocking tools like Afterburner to squeeze more life out of their existing GPUs instead of waiting for new stocks to arrive.
Against this backdrop, according to MSI, a website using the address 'afterburner-msi.space' is taking advantage of users by offering a fake version of its overclocking software for download. MSI says it's taking the necessary steps to have the website taken down, although at the time of writing it seems that the fraudulent site has already rendered itself inaccessible. The company reiterates that the latest version of its legitimate MSI Afterburner program will be found on its official page as soon as it's available. However, the software is still undergoing “routine maintenance” and remains unavailable to download at the moment.
Other Alternatives To MSI's Afterburner Tool
The fake MSI Afterburner is said to potentially carry viruses such as keyloggers or Trojans, which can allow hackers to wreak all sorts of havoc on the computers of unsuspecting users. People should steer clear of any downloadable software purporting to be MSI Afterburner for now, or any other similar-named program disguising itself to take advantage of its absence for that matter. There are some alternatives available that can be used in the meantime, though.
Those who need a tool to overclock or manage their GPUs performance right away could try RivaTuner, which is available as freeware and was even integrated into the MSI Afterburner program itself. EVGA's official precision X1 overclocking utility, meanwhile, comes with multiple set-ups and configurations. And there's also the ZOTAC Firestorm software, which offers a range of GPU tweaking tools, and works particularly well with Nvidia GeForce GPUs.
Source: MSI