Startpageing123 Virus Removal (for Chrome/Firefox/IE)

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Welcome to our Startpageing123 Virus removal guide. The following instructions will aid you in removing it together with WinSnare – the two usually go along together.

Browsing the Internet and not having your screen bombarded with different ads, pop-ups, and sponsored messages is almost impossible nowadays. It is annoying, it interrupts your activity, but this is how the online advertising industry runs. And sometimes, you may even bump into some really good offers. However, there is one type of software, called browser hijackers, which can be extremely aggressive when it comes to displaying advertisements on your screen. It uses a quite invasive method, known as browser hijacking, to modify your Chrome, Firefox, IE or other default browser that you are using, by imposing certain changes to it. One such program is Startpageing123 Virus, and thanks to its activity, now your homepage or search engine is probably replaced with some unfamiliar one and most of your searches get automatically redirected to different promotional sites without your approval. How to remove that and bring back your normal browsing is what we are going to show you here, so stay with us to find out more.

Can Startpageing123 Virus be a harmful virus?

As we already said above, Startpageing123 Virus falls in the category of browser hijackers. This program is capable of spamming your browser with all sorts of nagging ads, pop-ups, banners, box messages, new tabs and other forms of online adverts. Its activity may create huge irritation to the users, and often times it is not able to deliver any benefits or useful functionality. For this reason, many people may refer to Startpageing123 Virus as a virus. Fortunately, this is a very wrong classification because browser hijackers are not a harmful type of software. They do not have the typical malicious scripts that the Trojans, the Spyware or the Ransomware threats do. What is more, no browser hijacker has ever been related to a serious damage or system destruction. Programs like Startpageing123 Virus have one specific purpose and that is to generate a huge amount of advertisements and display them to the users. This way, every time someone clicks on the displayed ads, this brings profit to the hijacker developers through the infamous pay per click scheme. The users, however, may be redirected to such a huge and intrusive flow of sponsored ads, web pages, and promotional sites, that they may often prefer to uninstall Startpageing123 Virus from their computers, as this is the only way to remove all of its annoying adverts.

How can Startpageing123 Virus affect your machine?

Worrying about your system’s safety is not needed here since Startpageing123 Virus is not some kind of nasty virus or a tricky Ransomware threat that would do damage to your PC. However, keeping such a browser hijacker on your computer may still have some potentially unwanted effects. For example, you may not really be aware of but, sometimes, programs like Startpageing123 Virus may try to keep a track on your online searches and browsing history, in an attempt to customize the ads that they display for you. Apart from this being considered as a bit of a privacy invasion, what we would advise you is to be careful when being redirected to unfamiliar sites and interacting with the numerous ads. This aggressive advertising approach is not malicious itself, but some hackers eventually may use methods like Malvertising to spread viruses and malware via fake ads and infect the online users this way. Of course, the chance of you clicking on a contagious link or an ad is very minimal, but still, you never know when a well-camouflaged pop-up can sneak in and redirect you to an illegal web location or some contagious content. That’s why, for a safety reason, uninstalling Startpageing123 Virus may be a good option.

How to make sure that no browser hijacker gets inside your PC ever again?

Removing Startpageing123 Virus is not that complicated. You can easily follow the instructions in the removal guide below and safely detect and delete the related browser hijacker files. Once you do that, however, it is a good idea to ensure that no such software can get inside your system again. For that, you should understand how the browser hijackers spread and how to prevent them. One commonly used method for such programs to get installed on your computer is through software bundles. That’s why we would advise you to pay close attention every time you run a new setup on your PC. Read the EULA and always check for additionally bundled programs via the “Advanced/Custom” option of the installer. This way, you can always be in control of what software you are getting and whether to install it or not. Also, avoid non-reputed software sources like torrent sites, freeware or shareware platforms, pirate and sketchy content, as well as spam and different free downloads, as this is where you are more likely to catch programs like Startpageing123 Virus. 

Source: howtoremove.guide’s remove Startpageing123 guide

SUMMARY:

Name	Startpageing123 Virus
Type	Adware/Browser Hijacker
Danger Level	Medium (nowhere near threats like Ransomware, but still a security risk)
Symptoms	Homepage or search engine replacements, different ads, pop-ups, and sponsored messages uncontrollably keep popping on your screen.
Distribution Method	Software bundles, non-reputed software sources like torrent sites, freeware or shareware platforms, pirate and sketchy content, as well as spam and different free downloads.

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Welcome to our Startpageing123 Virus removal guide. The following instructions will aid you in removing the unwanted software from your PC.

Startpageing123 Virus Removal

I – 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
   1. If you are unable to spot Startpageing123 Virus, 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

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

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 Startpageing123 Virus 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 Startpageing123 Virus 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 Startpageing123 Virus, 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.