Antivirus protection since the advent of Windows operating systems has become an integral part of the security system. And by no means all anti-virus software products can provide proper protection. There are also those that themselves are somewhat reminiscent of viruses or are actually such.
Anyprotect: what is it?
One of these emerging threats is the Anyprotect virus. How to remove the program will be said a little later, but for now let's dwell on what this threat is.
In general, this virus belongs to the HiJackers group of browser hijackers, but it has quite serious differences from its counterparts. Like all other threats, the virus is introduced into all web browsers present in the system, replacing the start pages and default search engines, constantly redirecting to sites of dubious or advertising content, slowing down the operating system, unnecessarily increasing the load on the central processor and RAM, etc.
Virus features
However, it differs from other threats of this type in that, when deeply embedded in a computer system, the virus not only increases the load on system resources, but also, as it were, loads additional virus applets, whose codes are triggered when a particular resource is visited.
Another distinguishing feature is the built-in deletion protection. In the system, it is not masked, but it is impossible to remove it using regular means unless some action is taken. In addition, quite often it penetrates the system either without the knowledge of the user, or is installed as affiliate software, and then, in addition to its main effect, it begins to issue false threats about computer infection with an offer of immediate cleaning, which is supposedly an anti-virus scanner running in real time.
Plus, there is a permanent registration requirement.
The following is a detailed solution to the problem of how to remove Anyprotect once and for all. But first, a few words about what needs to be done before removal.
How to remove Anyprotect from the computer: preliminary steps
Of course, to detect a threat and neutralize it, you can initially use some kind of anti-virus scanner. Alas, often the result can not be calculated only for the reason that the application itself has the status of a trusted one.
In this case, it is better to use utilities like AdwCleaner, although they may not give a result. In most cases, the threat will have to be removed manually. How to remove Anyprotect?
Since the virus is protected from deletion, the first thing to do is get rid of all its keys in the system registry. To do this, the editor itself is called (regedit in the "Run" menu), and it searches for the threat name (Ctrl + F). Switching from one key found is done by pressing the F3 key or the Find Next button. As already clear, all records are subject to deletion.
Standard uninstall
Now, the question of how to remove Anyprotect, you can proceed directly. As already mentioned, the virus in the system is visible as an installed application, and you can find it even in the programs and components section, which is located in the Control Panel.
To uninstall, simply select this program from the list and press the delete button. But their own uninstallers of Windows-systems (and there are at least two of them) remove only the main components of the programs, leaving a huge amount of computer trash after them.
Removal of residues
Since we have already got rid of the registry keys (note that the system did not overload), now we need to find everything that remains of the virus at the file and directory levels.
We call the standard “Explorer” and set the name of the virus in the search line. Again, we delete all the results manually (from the "Recycle Bin" too). Quick deletion without moving to the "Trash" is done by the combination of Shift + Del. If some elements are not deleted, use the Unlocker program.
For browsers, check the properties of the shortcuts and see that the description of the object type ends with the name of the browser with the .exe extension or the name of the browser launch file, as for Opera (Launcher.exe). All that is after the extension, delete and save the changes. Then we change the search engine and the start page.
And only after that we reboot the system, and after restart, just in case, check it with the same AdwCleaner utility.
How to remove Anyprotect Scanner using uninstallers?
But, as practice shows, it is much easier to solve the problem of how to remove Anyprotect, you can, using programs like iObit Uninstaller. Their advantage is that they can uninstall even protected applications (as in our case), as well as detect and delete their remnants.
In the running program, select the virus application from the list, start the standard uninstall process, then activate the powerful scan (if it is not set by default) and get rid of all residues by checking the file destruction box at the bottom of the window. Upon completion of all operations, we reboot the system.