How to Manually Remove Spam Spyware & Popups

Antimalware programs and scanners are designed to detect and delete any spyware or adware that intrude on your system. Some adware and spyware may even cause intrusive popups. Many of the commercial and some freeware solutions are capable of doing the job as long as the software remains unmodified. Once a virus or other form of malware infects the antimalware program, it loses the ability to fix other spyware-related problems. Installing another scanner is not advisable since you still have looming threats—you must remove or uninstall the spyware manually to make these popups disappear.

Instructions

1. Close all running programs including any active antimalware programs. Some processes are possibly found on the system tray or notification area on the taskbar next to clock as well. Close these applications by right-clicking the icon and clicking “Exit,” “Close” or any related item that terminates the application.

2. Find and close any hidden applications that are running by pressing the “Ctrl,” “Alt,” and “Esc” keys simultaneously. Click the “Processes” tab and click the “User Name” column header button to sort the processes by user name. Find a process that you are not familiar with and click on it. Click the “End Process” button and confirm the dialog to terminate the process. Repeat this step with other unfamiliar processes.

3. Head to the “Add/Remove Programs” or “Programs and Features” Control Panel items to see what programs your system has. Find any entries that you are unfamiliar with or no longer need. Click on the “Change/Remove,” “Remove” or “Uninstall” buttons to uninstall the application eliminating possibilities for that program to launch on startup.

4. Configure your computer to show hidden files by loading Windows Explorer, clicking the “Tools” menu in the menu bar, and selecting “Folder Options.” If you are using Windows Vista or 7, press the “Alt” key on your keyboard to reveal the Windows Explorer menu bar. Click the “View” tab and click the “Show hidden files, folders and drives” option. Uncheck the “Hide protected operating system files” checkbox as well.

5. Head to your C: drive and look for any files that have suspicious filenames. Consider files that have “.vbs,” “.com,” “.exe,” “.html” and “.vbs” extensions as suspicious. Click on a file that you believe is suspicious and press the “Del” or “Delete” key on your keyboard to move the file to the “Recycle Bin.” Repeat this step in the “C:\\Windows” and “C:\\Windows\\System32” folders.

6. Restart your computer to notice the absence of popups, spyware and spam in your system.

Tips & Warnings

• Before uninstalling a program or ending a process, take note of the name or filename of the process or program. You can use this information to search online on ways to retrieve or reinstall the removed files if there are problems in your system.<br /><br />Any program names that have the words “Toolbar,” “Bar,” “Screensaver,” “Weather,” “Bargain” or “Shopping” are suspicious programs. Not all programs are harmful, but are possible sources of the threat.<br /><br />If you are unsure of the legitimacy of an executable file, right-click the file and click “Properties.” Click the “Details” tab to see if it has a “Product name” under the “Description.” If it does, the file is digitally signed and is not considered spyware.<br /><br />Another way to detect suspicious files in the “C:\\Windows” and “C:\\Windows\\System32” folders is to switch to the “Details” view by clicking “View” and clicking “Details.” Click the “Date modified” column header once to sort the files by date. Observe the files that were modified recently and ignore the ones that were modified years back.

• The default files found in C: include “autoexec.bat,” “boot.ini,” “bootlog.txt,” “config.sys,” “io.sys,” ntdetect.com,” ntldr” and “pagefile.sys.” Do not delete any of these important system files.<br /><br />Only empty the Recycle Bin after you used the computer long enough to conclude that you have no problems with your system with those files deleted.

References

• The Spyware Removal Guide: Manually Delete Spyware Files
• Bleeping Computer: How to See Hidden Files in Windows