Sweetpacks-search.com redirect is one of the nasty search engine redirect viruses that hijacks all your browsers including IE, Firefox and Chrome and interrupts your browsing activity. Is your homepage changed to Sweetpacks-search.com without your permission? Cannot remove Sweetpacks from your computer? Follow the removal guide to remove it step by step now.
Sweetpacks-search.com is a deceitful online search provider website that affiliated with browser hijackers which can change various browser settings, such as your proxy server usage and your designated homepage. Once inside, it can perform the same evil actions like the former redirect viruses Search.sweetpacks.com and Start.sweetpacks.com do by taking over the compromised browser and forcing your web browser to Sweetpacks-search.com constantly so as criminals can use the artificial traffic to boost affiliate payments. Since this is a phony search engine, it will not able to give web users any trustworthy search results linked to their inquiries. Instead, it may involve ZeroAccess Rootkit which could use the tracking cookie in an effort to deliver and show unwanted pop-up ads pertaining to the web user’s browsing habits, and gather Internet users’ confidential information in order to transfer to remote attackers.
Usually Sweetpacks-search.com hijacker is known to attack Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer, and can function in most versions of Windows, including Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8. Up to now, it is reported that Mac computer users have been the targets of this annoying hijackers as well. This virus hijacks the vulnerable web browser and alters browser configuration settings in an attempt to redirect Internet users to various commercial websites involving Sweetpacks-search.com. By using this way, the people behind this virus can use the artificial traffic to boost affiliate payments and probably they can view your browser and search history of to determine what sites you have been visiting and then extract data such as usernames and passwords. Thus, they could use that data along with the browser history to access your sensitive information without any permission. Users should never use Sweetpacks-search.com search engine because if you click on any links that provided from this bogus search, it may redirect you to blank websites, to advertisements or even to malicious websites which will show you misleading information and try to attack your PC. Now running security tools and reinstalling browsers are not working to remove Sweetpacks-search.com virus, therefore, it is suggested users to perform a manual way to get rid of this annoying threat step by step.
Homepage is changed without any permission.
Desktop background is gone somehow.
Browser setting is modified.
Browsers like IE and Firefox works slowly.
Registry files are corrupted.
Considering Sweetpacks-search.com redirect can’t be fixed by any security tools, uses can use the manual guide below to fix this issue without any risk.
1. Clear all the cookies of your affected browsers.
Since tricky hijacker virus has the ability to use cookies for tracing and tracking the internet activity of users, it is suggested users to delete all the cookies before a complete removal.
Google Chrome:
Click on the “Tools” menu and select “Options”.
Click the “Under the Bonnet” tab, locate the “Privacy” section and click the “Clear browsing data” button.
Select “Delete cookies and other site data” to delete all cookies from the list.
Internet Explorer:
Open Internet explorer window
Click the “Tools” button
Point to “safety” and then click “delete browsing history”
Tick the “cookies” box, then click “delete”
Mozilla Firefox:
Click on Tools, then Options, select Privacy
Click “Remove individual cookies”
In the Cookies panel, click on “Show Cookies”
To remove a single cookie click on the entry in the list and click on the “Remove Cookie button”
To remove all cookies click on the “Remove All Cookies button”
2. End the malicious process from Task Manager.
Once Sweetpacks search virus is installed, computer user may notice that CPU usage randomly jumps to 100 percent, slowing down the computer. If your system’s CPU spike is constant, users should check from Task Manager and see if there is a suspicious process occupying the system resources and then end it immediately.
(The name of the virus process can be random.)
Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc at the same time and it will open up task manager directly. Then change to “Processes” tab.
3. Show hidden files and folders.
Open Folder Options by clicking the Start button, clicking Control Panel, clicking Appearance and Personalization, and then clicking Folder Options.
Click the View tab.
Under Advanced settings, click Show hidden files and folders, uncheck Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) and then click OK.
4. Remove all the malicious files manually.
%AppData%Local[random].exe
C:\Documents and Settings\LocalService\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\*.exe
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRun “[RANDOM]”
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\exefile\shell\open\command “IsolatedCommand” = ‘”%1? %*’
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\exefile\shell\runas\command “(Default)” = ‘”%1? %*’
Although Sweetpacks-search.com looks like a friendly website, with its bright colors and welcoming-looking search box, it is just a spam engine that does nothing but delivers ads. Users should not be taken in by the juvenile tactics. This virus completely interrupts your browsing activities and threaten your computer. When you open Google and try to search something, instead of taking you to the page you want, you will be redirected to Sweetpacks-search.com. More than that, it can change your default homepage to be itself and also come up as a new tab as soon as the browser is opened. This bogus search provider is produced by cyber criminals to make money from the pay-per-click technique and increased website traffic. Users attacked by it start finding themselves redirected to Sweetpacks-search.com constantly which presents as a fake search engine. Obviously, it is really annoying to view these corrupted pages and ads again and again, at the cost of your time. Therefore, it is highly suggested users to remove Sweetpacks-search.com redirect as soon as possible.
Note: If you are not knowledgeable enough to be able to distinguish the location of this virus, or you are afraid of making mistake during the manual removal, please contact experts from YooCare Online Tech Support for further help.
Published by on October 11, 2013 9:14 am, last updated on October 11, 2013 9:14 am
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.