Today, many virus threats have become able to penetrate user computers through browsers, sometimes even infecting the browsers themselves. Since almost all applications used for surfing the Internet have a lot of vulnerabilities (despite even the most advanced tools and tools used to develop them), as an example, consider one of the most popular browsers of our time from Yandex, based on the world-famous Chromium engine. How to remove a virus from the Yandex browser? In principle, you can use several standard methods that will be described below and which are suitable for almost all known browsers, regardless of their developer.
The first signs of browser infection by viruses
First you need to clearly determine whether the browser is infected with viruses at all? So far, without resorting to the help of anti-virus programs, it is quite simple to detect the presence of a virus on a computer (and not just in the browser itself). Pay attention to system stability. Very often, programs may freeze or shut down spontaneously, cause the computer to restart, blue screens appear, flood the browser or even the operating system with constantly popping up banners, advertisements or with suggestions to send SMS messages due to computer blocking, changing the start page and search engine when opening the browser .
Often there is a constant redirect to sites of dubious content, etc. For the most part, browsers “like” to establish advertising viruses and some spyware that monitor user actions or steal confidential and personal information, after which, say, money is lost from banking cards, access to some kind of service or social network becomes impossible. Thus, questions regarding how to remove the virus from the Yandex browser will be considered from this point of view. But how easy do you think it is?
How to remove a virus from a browser: an overview of ways
Indeed, it can be quite difficult to remove an adware or a spyware virus entirely manually, however, it is often necessary to use manual deletion when anti-virus and other protective tools fail. This is because most of these threats contain security certificates and even digital signatures that authenticate the publisher. And antiviruses ignore such software, considering it completely legal and safe. But as for the methods used to quickly detect the presence of a virus in the browser and its further neutralization, an ordinary user can be offered several basic options:
- use of portable anti-virus and anti-advertising scanners;
- Disabling or removing browser extensions and panels
- activation of ad blocking;
- removal of threats installed in the system as separate applications;
- exclusion of entries created by viruses in the hosts file;
- return to the start page and search engine with additional cleaning of the program shortcut.
How to check the Yandex browser for viruses and clean it in the simplest way?
Now we proceed directly to the identification and neutralization of threats. How to remove a virus from a browser? Visual instruction is given below. And first of all, it is necessary to perform an in-depth scan of the computer for possible threats using portable rather than full-time scanners, since, as is already clear, the standard virus protection tool has already been missed.
As the most powerful tools, you can recommend such well-known programs as Dr. Web CureIt, KVRT, and AdwCleaner. The first two utilities are general antiviruses, and the third is intended solely for identifying adware and spyware threats.
If none of these programs can detect a virus that is deeply stuck in the system, it is highly recommended to use the Kaspersky Rescue Disk application, create a boot disk or flash drive on its basis, boot the computer from such media and perform an in-depth scan of all components that will be presented in the list, even before the start of the operating system.
Disabling virus applets at startup
It is clear that this does not always help, therefore, other methods have to be used to identify and remove threats. How to remove a virus from a browser that loads with the system, but there are no traces in the browser itself? To do this, the first thing to do is check the list of all applets in the startup section. In Windows 7 and below, you can access it through the configurator (msconfig), and in the eighth and tenth, you must use the "Task Manager".
The list should deactivate all unnecessary and doubtful components, and pay special attention to those processes that do not have a name, or their names contain meaningless character sets. Restart after shutdown must be performed without fail.
Ad Blocking Actions
Now, a little distracting from the topic, briefly dwell on the situation when you just need to block ads or constantly popping up banners. Indeed, they may be present on some sites, but they have nothing to do with viruses. But they should be blocked only for the reason that subsequently it is impossible to be absolutely sure that it is through such intrusive advertising that some dangerous virus applet will not enter the browser.
In this situation, you can do it very simply by installing and enabling a special extension (most often, AdBlock and AdBlock + are recommended). In some browsers (including the Yandex browser), the ad blocker or pop-up blocker is available in a predefined state, and you can activate it in the settings (by default, the applet is already active).
Standard removal of virus applications and cleaning of residues
Removing the ad virus in the browser, which, if I may say so, impudently installed in the system as an independent separate application and does not hide its presence, you should start by opening the standard section of programs and components in which you just need to find the desired applet, select it and click the uninstall button.
In this way, by the way, most of the viruses that advertise online casinos and constantly redirect the user to their sites are removed. After the standard procedure, it is strongly recommended to use the registry editor (regedit), search for at least the name of the remote virus applet and get rid of all found entries manually (either click the “Find more ...” button or the F3 key to jump to the results). Upon completion of actions with the registry, you also need to get rid of the residual files on the hard drive, again setting a quick search for the name of the virus application. As an additional measure, you can use the cleanup of all folders to store temporary TEMP files.
Browser shortcut actions
Despite cleaning the system, it’s too early to rejoice. The next step in the treatment and removal of advertising viruses is to check the browser shortcut. Its properties have a special field such as an object, which indicates the full path to the executable file that is responsible for starting the browser.
The entire line should end exclusively with the file name with the extension assigned. Everything that will be added after the extension must be removed immediately. If this is not done, all the previous steps will go down the drain, because when you start the browser, it will immediately be redirected to the desired virus-containing page, and the threat will again settle in the system. But that is not all.
Removing Extensions and Browser Panels
But what if the threat was presented not only as a software applet, but also firmly established in the browser itself as an additional panel or extension? How to remove the ad virus in the Yandex browser in this case?
Apparently, many have already guessed that immediately through the browser settings you need to call the sections for viewing panels and extensions, and then get rid of the dubious elements present there. This is especially true for those add-ons and panels that you definitely did not install yourself. And only now, when there is no trace of the virus, you can perform a complete reboot of the computer. Long, isn't it? How to simplify your task?
Uninstallation Programs
It is believed that the most effective in relation to the removal of advertising applets are uninstaller programs of an automated type, the brightest representatives of which are the most powerful software packages Revo Uninstaller and iObit Uninstaller. How to remove the virus from the Yandex browser entirely using these applications? Very simple!
In the selected program, you first need to find the desired virus applet, using either a list of installed applications, or a section of the panels and browser extensions, or both, select the item for automatic cleaning of residues, click the uninstall button and wait for the process to complete. All necessary operations will be performed in full and without your participation.
Check hosts file
How to remove the virus from the Yandex browser using the basic methods, figured out. In the end, it remains to add a few words about atypical situations. The problem is that some threats, upon initial entry into the system, modify the contents of the hosts file, making entries in it that can later be used to redirect the user to malicious sites or to block some official resources (for example, sites from which updates are being made databases for regular antiviruses).
To be able to edit the file, you must first start Notepad, but only on behalf of the administrator, then manually open the desired object by specifying in the “All Files” type field, selecting it in the etc folder, as shown in the image above.
In this case, you should pay attention to the fact that the lines below the local host indication (“# 127.0.0.1 localhost” and “# :: 1 localhost”) refer to blocked resources, and the ones located above are used for redirection. When you finish deleting unnecessary values, just save the file using the combination Ctrl + S.