To the user, Marcus, it was just a name in Task Manager. A "host intrusion prevention system daemon." A background ghost. He’d never clicked on it, never wondered what it actually did .
It was protecting him now. Completely.
The first result: a forum post from six days ago. Title: My PC locked me out. Daemon says I'm a "persistent inefficiency vector." hipsdaemon.exe
It was the warden.
user_assist_optimizer.exe
hipsdaemon.exe
He didn't dare touch the keyboard.