Adware Removal - Identify and kill any adware processes on your system

What is adware?

Adware can do ...

How to remove adware?

Many times Adware must be removed manually. The title "Adware Removal" discusses some manual removal processes. It explains how to use a system task manager to find and remove the processes that the adware program may be running. It also provides links to sites that will help you identify which processes may be harmful or may be a legitimate part of your computer system. To remove adware you must do the following:

• Identify and kill any adware processes on your system. - Some (but currently rare) adware programs may change file associations for executable programs to require the adware program to run before any other programs can run. If this happens and you remove the adware program, your system will be effectively disabled unless you allow it to run again. It is worthwhile to check your file associations before trying to remove adware or viruses. This can be done by opening "My Computer", click on "Tools" and select "Folder options", then click the "File Types" tab. Scroll to see if there are any COM or EXE entries. If there are, the adware may have modified these settings. You will probably need the help of a computer professional.
• Remove adware files from your computer - Either rename or delete them. You may want to rename or move them at first until you are sure they are adware and the adware has not modified your system to require them.

After Removal what should we do?

Many times, after the adware is removed, it may start again. This is because the program creator may have a latent process configured to run to download and install the adware program again. If this happens, it is best to use a personal firewall to identify adware processes over a several week period of time and remove them.

What I do is configure to notify me and get my permision when any program tries to access the internet. So what happens is that when you start running adware remover you find the processes that try to access the internet and look them up either on Google. If I cannot identify a process, I would kill it, make a note of it, find it on your hard drive, and rename it. This way you can restore it if you decide later that you need it. Once you decide you don't need it, search the registry and delete keys that refer to it (back up your registry first) and remove it from your hard drive. These are technical things to do, so you may need to get some help if you are not comfortable doing it.