How to Remove Chrome Search Club “Virus” (Update)

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Welcome to our Chrome Search Club “Virus” removal guide. The following instructions will aid you in removing the unwanted software from your PC.

If your computer has recently been infected with a program called Chrome Search Club “Virus”, there are a number of symptoms you are likely to be experiencing at this point. Most of them have to do with your browser and browsing experience, whether you’re using Chrome, Firefox, Explorer or some of the other popular browsing programs. Chrome Search Club “Virus” is what’s known as a browser hijacker and it’s called that because it alters the settings of your browser, making it behave in a certain way. For example, the first thing to give this hijacker away would have likely been the changed homepage and/or the newly set default search engine. Other signs of an ongoing infection include your search requests being redirected to sponsored pages and displaying a bunch of advertisements among the results. Speaking of ads, you may be seeing a dramatic increase of those on your screen, as well, no matter what website you’re on. These can come in every shape, size and color of the rainbow: from popups, to box messages and large banners taking up half the page. We don’t doubt that you may be beyond fed up with this activity and therefore we would like to offer you a simple and effective solution with our removal instructions below.

But first – a little more information about Chrome Search Club “Virus”

You may have a thousand questions running through your mind regarding this browser hijacker, especially if this is your first time dealing with one. For example, we’re sure you may have safety concerns and might want to know whether or not Chrome Search Club poses a threat to you or your system. Browser hijackers are quite different from viruses and malware and certainly aren’t in the same category, by far. Contrary to real viruses like Trojans and ransomware, hijackers cannot cause any direct damage to your computer, nor can they self-install on it. Nevertheless, they don’t quite qualify as regular, useful software either. And that’s because in all honesty, they don’t really provide any benefit for users. The only ones who benefit from their existence are their developers and those, whose products and services they’re busy promoting on your screen.

See, all those ads you’ve been seeing lately – they are all paid for, and the software developers behind programs like Chrome Search Club earn revenue based on the number of times you see or interact with a given ad. This also entails a series of unwanted effects that aren’t as obvious as the advertising process itself. For example, browser hijackers are known for their ability to track your browsing history. Moreover, they actually use it as a basis for their advertising campaigns, so they can show you ads that are more relevant to your personally. This practice alone may unsettle users already, but think about the future of the collected traffic data, as it’s called. It may be sold to third parties, who may in turn use it to spam you later on in time. In addition to this, software like Chrome Search Club often modifies certain aspects of your system to make the display and generation of ads easier and prevent your Firewall and such from blocking any of the promotional contents.

To be a bit more specific, hijackers alter certain system registry files to achieve this, but there’s also a serious side effect to these actions. As a result of them, your computer automatically becomes more vulnerable to external threats and becomes weaker in its ability to ward of virus attacks. On top of that, it doesn’t help that you constantly get redirected to potentially dangerous web locations that may be harboring malware.

Another thing you may be wondering about in regards to Chrome Search Club is how it ended up on your PC in the first place. You certainly couldn’t have installed yourself… could you? Well, as we already pointed out earlier, hijackers cannot self-install, so yes, it did require your permission to integrate with your system. However, you may have given it without even realizing it. Usually, developers bundle browser hijackers and similar software with other programs and hope that the users will use the Default installation settings and thus install the added components as well. And that’s typically exactly how it happens. So, this can easily be avoided from now on if you use the advanced or custom settings, when installing new programs.

Source: Howtoremove.guide’s instructions How to Remove Chrome Search Club “Virus”

Chrome Search Club “Virus” Removal

I – Safe mode and revealing hidden files

1. Boot your PC into Safe Mode /link/
2. Reveal hidden files and folders /link/

II – Uninstallation

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1. Use the Winkey+R keyboard combination, write Control Panel in the search field and hit enter.
   
2. Go to Uninstall a program under Programs.
   
3. Seek the unwanted software, select it and then click on Uninstall

If you are unable to spot Chrome Search Club, search for any unrecognized programs that you do not remember installing on your PC – the unwanted software might disguise itself by going under a different name.

III – Cleaning all your browsers

1. Go to your browser’s icon, right-click on it and select Properties.
   
2. Go to the Shortcut tab and in the Target make sure to delete anything written after “.exe”.
   
3. Now, open your browser and follow the instructions below depending on whether you are using Chrome, Mozilla or IE.

• Chrome users:

1. Go to your browser’s main menu located in the top-right corner of the screen and select Settings.
   
2. Scroll down, click on Show Advanced Settings and then select Clear browsing data. Just to be sure, tick everything and clear the data.
   
3. Now, in the left pane, go to Extensions and look through all extensions that are integrated within your browser. If you notice any suspicious add-on, disable it and then remove it.
   

• Firefox users:

1. Similarly to Chrome, go to the main menu and select Add-ons and then Extensions.
2. Remove any suspicious browser extensions that you may have even if they do not have the name Chrome Search Club on them.

• IE users:

1. Go to Tools and select Manage add-ons.
   
2. Click on all add-on types from the left pane and check if there is anything suspicious in the right panel. In case you find anything shade, make sure to remove it.

IV – Removing Shady processes

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1. Go to your start menu, type Task Manager in the search field and from the results open View running processes with Task Manager.
   
2. Thoroughly look through all processes. The name Chrome Search Club might not be there, but if you notice any shady looking process that consumes high amounts of memory it might be ran by the unwanted program.
3. If you spot the process ran by Chrome Search Club, right-click on it, open its file location and delete everything in there. Then go back to the Task Manager and end the process.
   

V – DNS check

1. In the start menu search box write View Network Connections and open the first result.
   
2. Right-click on the network connection you are using and go to Properties.
   
3. Select Internet Protocol Version (TCP/IPv4) and click on Properties.
   
4. If Obtain DNS server addresses automatically is not checked, check it.
   
5. Go to Advanced and select the DNS If there is anything in the DNS server addresses field, remove it and click OK.
   
6. Click OK on the rest of the opened windows.