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Welcome to our StartPageing 123 “Virus” removal guide. The following instructions will aid you in removing the unwanted software from your PC.
If you’ve gotten really angry with the strange way that your browser behaves recently, then there might be a browser hijacker on your machine. A never ending flow of ads, pop-ups, banners, annoying promotional messages and constant page redirects – they all may come from a program named StartPageing 123 “Virus”, which has probably invaded your Chrome or Firefox browser without your approval. Not only that, but this browser hijacker may have also messed with your homepage or search engine by replacing them with some strange and unfamiliar ones. Is there a way to get rid of all these changes? Fortunately, yes! On this page, you are going to find a removal guide, which contains step-by-step instructions on how to remove the annoying ads and uninstall the intrusive browser hijacker. You don’t need to be an expert to follow them, and if you are really looking for a permanent solution to your online disturbance, this is the right place to be. Just make sure you carefully read the information below, which will give you a general idea about the program you are dealing with, after which proceed to the removal instructions.
A browser hijacker – what is this and how dangerous can it be?
A browser hijacker is a piece of software, with is often referred to as potentially unwanted. The reason for that is its intrusiveness and the rather aggressive way it imposes changes to your browser. A program like StartPageing 123 usually floods your screen with different ads, products, services and promotions and redirects you to some sponsored messages and web pages. But behind that aggressiveness, there is an online advertising method called Pay-Per-Click, which explains all of its strange and annoying activities. A browser hijacker is generally a tool, used for online advertising and it is programmed to expose you to as many advertisements as possible. The moment you click on some of them, the developers, who own the program, earn some money from your clicks. So, basically, the profit is the main purpose for the development of such annoying pieces of software.
However, are they malicious? Not really. Programs like StartPageing 123 are generally not interested in harming your computer or performing any criminal deeds on your system. Unlike computer viruses or malicious threats like Trojans, Ransomware, and Spyware, browser hijackers only serve the needs of the online advertising industry and are not associated with any dangerous activities. A real virus, on the other hand, or a nasty script from the Ransomware type would definitely do no good to your machine. It may heavily compromise your security, corrupt or destroy your system, encrypt your files and blackmail you. Fortunately, a browser hijacker like StartPageing 123 is not capable of performing any of these criminal activities, therefore it is not considered a danger to your system. Then, why would you want to remove it?
How can StartPageing 123 affect your system?
Even though StartPageing 123 may not corrupt your PC, you may quickly get irritated by its activity and may wish to uninstall it. Many users complain that the browser hijacker heavily interferes with their normal browsing and also affects their browser’s speed and system performance. You may also agree on that, especially when you have to frequently experience redirects to web pages that you have never intended to visit, just because your browser simply doesn’t want to respond to your searches and keeps showing you all sorts of irrelevant and sponsored content. On top of that, you may not know that StartPageing 123 may monitor all of your browsing activity – your history, the pages you visit, the things that you search for on the web, your bookmarks, everything. The developers may program the browser hijacker to do that so they can gain a better idea about your interests and preferences. Based on that, they may try to display more ads on your screen, hoping that you will click on them and bring some more profits. The tricky thing is that they may not ask for your approval on that. But what if you are not OK with the idea of being tracked? Then, removing the annoying program may be your solution.
How did StartPageing 123 sneak inside your PC?
Browser hijackers may be quite tricky when it comes to working their way into your computer. They usually use a distribution method known as software bundle, where they are packed inside the installation manager of some other software – be it an attractive application, a free program, a player, a game, etc. To start operating on your machine, however, you will need to install them. That happens mostly without knowing, because when you download an installer and run it, you may not be clearly notified about the presence of the browser hijacker unless you carefully read the EULA or manually check for it. That’s why we always advise our readers to use installation options like “Advanced” or “Custom” to prevent such programs from getting installed by default along with the software they desire.
StartPageing 123 “Virus” Removal
I – Uninstallation
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- Use the Winkey+R keyboard combination, write Control Panel in the search field and hit enter.
- Go to Uninstall a program under Programs.
- Seek the unwanted software, select it and then click on Uninstall
- If you are unable to spot StartPageing 123, 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.
II – Safe mode and revealing hidden files
III – Cleaning all your browsers
- Go to your browser’s icon, right-click on it and select Properties.
- Go to the Shortcut tab and in the Target make sure to delete anything written after “.exe”.
- Now, open your browser and follow the instructions below depending on whether you are using Chrome, Mozilla or IE.
- Chrome users:
- Go to your browser’s main menu located in the top-right corner of the screen and select Settings.
- Scroll down, click on Show Advanced Settings and then select Clear browsing data. Just to be sure, tick everything and clear the data.
- 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:
- Similarly to Chrome, go to the main menu and select Add-ons and then Extensions.
- Remove any suspicious browser extensions that you may have even if they do not have the name StartPageing 123 on them.
- IE users:
- Go to Tools and select Manage add-ons.
- 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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- Go to your start menu, type Task Manager in the search field and from the results open View running processes with Task Manager.
- Thoroughly look through all processes. The name StartPageing 123 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.
- If you spot the process ran by StartPageing 123, 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
- In the start menu search box write View Network Connections and open the first result.
- Right-click on the network connection you are using and go to Properties.
- Select Internet Protocol Version (TCP/IPv4) and click on Properties.
- If Obtain DNS server addresses automatically is not checked, check it.
- Go to Advanced and select the DNS If there is anything in the DNS server addresses field, remove it and click OK.
- Click OK on the rest of the opened windows.
