The AutoStandByPro installer always includes a Windows service named “asbp_helper” (shown in Windows as “AutoStandByPro service responsible background tasks”). The service starts a small helper program in every user session on the computer. The helper reports the mouse and keyboard activity of that session, so that AutoStandByPro can see user activity in all sessions and not only in its own, for example when another user is signed in through Fast User Switching or Remote Desktop. This is what the “Global User Activity” setting uses.
The service is managed for you by your license. Without a Plus license it is installed but set to Manual and stopped, so it does nothing. When you activate a Plus license, AutoStandByPro sets the service to Automatic and starts it. When you delete the Plus license, AutoStandByPro stops the service and sets it back to Manual.
Changing a service needs administrator permission, so Windows shows one permission prompt (UAC) at that moment. If you click “No”, or the service does not stop when asked, AutoStandByPro keeps working normally using its own activity detection and tells you what happened; the change is tried again the next time you start AutoStandByPro or change the license. If the service does not stop within about 15 seconds, AutoStandByPro ends its process to make sure it does not keep running without a license.
The service needs no configuration. With a Plus license it is set to start automatically with Windows, and AutoStandByPro checks it every time it starts up. If something is wrong, you see one of these messages:
Without the service AutoStandByPro keeps working normally and detects the user activity of its own session only.
The background service is part of AutoStandByPro Plus.
AutoStandByPro is new software and is not digitally signed yet. Some security programs judge a new program by how many people already use it, and by what it does while it runs. When AutoStandByPro Plus is activated, the background service and its helper program start watching mouse and keyboard activity in every Windows session, which is what Plus needs for the “Global User Activity” setting. A security program can mistake this for something harmful and report AutoStandByPro.exe as, for example, “IDP.Generic” or “Suspicious file”. We have seen this with Norton and Avast. In our tests the free edition, without Plus, was not blocked.
This is a false alarm. AutoStandByPro uses the activity only to decide when your computer may go to sleep; it does not record or send what you type or do. If your security software warns or blocks the program: