McAfee cannot remove virus ismartsurf. I am unable to uninstall it. System restore is also disabled. Please help

[kushal]

McAfee cannot remove virus ismartsurf. I am unable to uninstall it. System restore is also disabled. Please help how to remove. Thanks !

[exbrit]

Look in the last link in my signature below and use Adwcleaner plus Malwarebytes Free as an extra check.   To keep Malwarebytes totally free do NOT accept the free trial or click the free trial link.

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[exbrit]

By the way there is a removal guide I found but it is for istartsurf, not ismartsurf, so not sure it's what you are looking for.  The tools would be the same anyway.

How to remove iStartSurf.com virus (Removal Guide)

[llamamecomoquie]

Hi,

It is nice to use free tools to clean virus but it is not good to improve McAfee detections a nd be included in DAT.

Please, run stinger a McAfee free tool and will collect samples and will upload to McAfee Labs to be analized abd if a virus is found will be included in the DAT

http://www.mcafee.com/es/downloads/free-tools/stinger.aspx

Best regards,

Jose Maria

[exbrit]

It's GetSusp (also linked in my signature last link above) that forwards items to the labs for analysis if detected, not Stinger   The whole point of my recommending 3rd party tools occasionally is because no A/V, no matter what brand, will detect everything and never will, that's the nature of things.   These people need quick solutions, not wait until the labs catch up, if they do, which with many types of new malware is not always possible.

[Hayton]

McAfee won't stop this or block it because it's classed as a PUP (Potentially Useful Program). In theory it's just an enhanced search engine, but in the short time it's been noticed (about a month) it's picked up a lot of hostile criticism (see https://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/istartsurf.com)

WhoIs shows that the istartsurf[dot]com website is running from a server in Dallas Texas, but the people behind the product are Chinese - an unknown company (name and details hidden) in Beijing. The registrar for the domain may be the developer, since it's a hosting provider and outsourcing company (HICHINA ZHICHENG TECHNOLOGY LTD)

More details at IStartSurf.com WHOIS, DNS, & Domain Info - DomainTools

It might be relevant that that Chinese registrar is associated with warnings - many warnings - in the past about internet scams, and that there is a whole slew of domains registered by it which host Zeus banking malware. Maybe they're just careless, or perhaps don't care, about who they allow to register with them for a website.

Examples (many others, but all relate to the website not the domain registrar)

ZeuS Tracker :: Registrar HICHINA ZHICHENG TECHNOLOGY LTD.

www.scamwarners.com View topic - Www.pspywf.com is a scam fraud website

To get rid of this PUP use the Malwaretips advice given above.

[Hayton]

The website is owned by this company (Greensky Technology), with a US address, but it's still registered in China. Note the Red WOT rating.

[llamamecomoquie]

Hi there,

You can try http://malwaretips.com/blogs/remove-istartsurf-virus/

Best regards,

Jose Maria

[Hayton]

Already recommended in reply #2.

This new version of Jive has a tendency to replace the URL with the webpage header. Sometimes this is unhelpful.

[exbrit]

Thread locked to prevent people from spamming it.