Browser Assistant

OFFERWe tested that Spyhunter successfully removes parasite* and we recommend using it. Manual removal without a program may take hours, it can harm your system if you are not careful, and parasite may reinstall itself at the end if you fail to delete its core files.

Download SpyHunter (Free Remover)

7-day Free Trial w/Credit card, no charge upfront or if you cancel up to 2 days before expiration; Subscription price varies per region w/ auto renewal unless you timely cancel; notification before you are billed; 30-day money-back guarantee; Read full terms and more information about free remover.

*Source of claim SH can remove it.

Browser Assistant

Browser Assistant is rogue software that is categorized as a Trojan Horse virus. The Browser Assistant Trojan is known for being able to introduce additional unwanted programs to the infected computer, as well as hijack the user’s browsers and make unwanted changes to them.

If you have noticed any strange changes in your main browser (or any of your other browsers), or if one or more unfamiliar apps/programs have recently been installed on your computer without your informed permission, it is highly likely that you are dealing with the Browser Assistant Trojan. It should be said that this is not the most dangerous Trojan Horse virus there is and, for the most part, it seems that its main goal is to propagate and distribute other rogue programs and apps, including browser hijackers, adware, PUPs/PUAs (potentially unwanted programs/apps), etc. This means that your PC is probably not directly threatened by the Browser Assistant Trojan, but its presence in the system could eventually get your machine infected with a more harmful piece of malware and/or expose you to all sorts of intricate online scams.

What is IE Browser Assistant?

IE Browser Assistant is a piece of malware that can get attached to any browser (not only IE) and cause it to automatically page-redirect the user to potentially unsafe sites. The IE Browser Assistant malware may also facilitate the unwanted installation of additional rogue programs.

One of the main aspects of your system that’s likely to get affected by Browser Assistant is, as the virus’ name suggests, your browser. If this Trojan is on your computer, it may cause the main browser in the system to spam your screen with ads, reroute your traffic to unknown (and potentially unsafe) pages, as well as secretly collect personal data related to your browsing habits. This level of access is unacceptable when it is available to a rogue program such as Browser Assistant, and there is an array of risks associated with it. As we already said, you could get exposed to scams due to the questionable page-redirects and ads spammed by this Trojan, and you may also unknowingly get more malware added to your computer. Also, any data collected by Browser Assistant or other software related to it could end up in the hands of scammers and hackers, and this could make you an easy target for them.

Is Browser Assistant a virus?

Browser Assistant is a potentially harmful program that antiviruses detect as Trojan.BrowserAssistant.PS – a rogue software that could automatically install PUPs on the computer. Browser Assistant is, therefore, categorized as a Trojan Horse that can expose you to adware, hijackers, and other rogue programs.

According to a number of security tools and antivirus programs, Browser Assistant is a Trojan Horse virus that needs to be removed from the system ASAP. Since deleting this malware is considerably more difficult and time-consuming than removing a regular program, we will try to provide you with all the help you may need in order to successfully clean your computer from this Trojan Horse infection. Detailed removal instructions on how to take care of the Browser Assistant malware can be found below alongside a trusty malware-deletion tool in case you may need the extra help.

SUMMARY:

*Source of claim SH can remove it.

How to remove Browser Assistant?

To remove Browser Assistant, you must methodically clean your computer from any rogue programs, processes, system settings, and files in the following way:

1. First, check the Uninstall a Program section of the Control Panel for Browser Assistant or any other potentially unwanted programs and try to uninstall anything questionable you find.
2. End any Trojan Horse processes found in the Task Manager.
3. Clean the AppData, LocalAppData, ProgramData, WinDir, and Temp folders from potentially rogue files.
4. To remove Browser Assistant, you should also revoke any changes made in by the virus in the System Registry, the Hosts file, your network’s DNS settings, and the Startup items list.

Here is how to perform the removal of Browser Assistant in more detail for those of you who may need additional help with the steps listed above:

Detailed instructions for removing Browser Assistant

Step 1

You must first access the Start Menu, find in it the Control Panel, and open it. If you don’t see the Control Panel icon in the menu, search for it using the search bar in the Start Menu. Once you open the Control Panel, open its Uninstall a Program section, find Browser Assistant in the list, select it, and click Uninstall from the top to launch its uninstallation wizard. Complete the uninstallation process and then do the same with any other questionable programs you may notice in the list.

Note: Many users have reported being unable to uninstall Browser Assistant from the Uninstall a Program list. If you are having similar problems, simply move on to the next steps, and remember to return to this list and try to uninstall the Browser Assistant entry once again once you are finished with the rest of the guide.

Step 2

WARNING! READ CAREFULLY BEFORE PROCEEDING!

*Source of claim SH can remove it.

Launch the Task manager by using the following keyboard combination:

• [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [Esc]

When you see the Task Manager appear on your monitor, select the section labelled Processes, and try to find in it a process named Browser Assistant or something similar. If you do find such a process, right-click it, open its File Location folder, then right-click the process again, and select End Process Tree. After that, go back to the File Location folder and delete it (the entire folder).

If you didn’t see a Browser Assistant process (or even if you did), look for other sketchy-looking processes – ones with suspiciously-high memory and/or processor (CPU) use and names that don’t look familiar and seem like they could be related to a malicious program. If such processes can be seen in the Task Manager, do the following to figure out if they need to be stopped as well:

First and foremost, Google the names of anything you deem questionable – if it’s truly a threat, there will most likely be a thread about it on security forums that confirm your suspicions. Just make sure that you are getting your information from reputable sources.

Next, go to the File Location folder of the suspected process and test each file stored there for malware code by using our free scanner that you will find below.

Each file will be scanned with up to 64 antivirus programs to ensure maximum accuracy

This scanner is free and will always remain free for our website's users.

This file is not matched with any known malware in the database. You can either do a full real-time scan of the file or skip it to upload a new file. Doing a full scan with 64 antivirus programs can take up to 3-4 minutes per file.

Full ScanUpload New File

Drag and Drop File Here To Scan

Upload File

Analyzing 0 s

Each file will be scanned with up to 64 antivirus programs to ensure maximum accuracy

This scanner is based on VirusTotal's API. By submitting data to it, you agree to their Terms of Service and Privacy Policy, and to the sharing of your sample submission with the security community. Please do not submit files with personal information if you do not want them to be shared.

If during the scan, one or more of the files are found to be malicious, you should most definitely end the rogue process and then delete the entire File Location folder where the malicious files are located.

Step 3

*Source of claim SH can remove it.

Boot to Safe Mode to help prevent Browser Assistant from starting its rogue processes again and potentially hindering the remainder of the removal process.

Step 4

For this step, first search for Folder Options in the Start Menu, click the Folder Options icon, and select its View tab, where you must find and enable the Show hidden files, folders, and drives option (if it’s not currently enabled). After that, select OK to save the change you’ve made.

Next, type %AppData% in the Start Menu, hit the Enter key on your keyboard, sort the contents of the newly-opened folder by order of the date they’ve been created and delete any file or folder that seems linked to the Browser Assistant Trojan. To help you figure out which files may be malicious or which folders may contain such files, we once again remind you to use the free scanner that we have posted on this page.

After this, repeat this process with these next three folders %LocalAppData%, %ProgramData%, %WinDir%. Finally, visit the Temp folder (%Temp% in the Start Menu) and delete all of its contents (there’s no need to scan the files here, simply delete everything).

How to remove Browser Assistant from Windows 10?

To remove Browser Assistant from Windows, it’s very important to make sure no changes made by this Trojan to your system are allowed to remain in it.

1. First you must check the properties settings of the network you use the most often and make sure it has its default settings enabled.
2. Next, you should disable any Browser Assistant items or other questionable entries shown in the Startup items list.
3. Thirdly, delete any rogue IPs that may be present in your system’s Hosts file.
4. To remove Browser Assistant from Windows, you must finally check the Registry for malware items and erase them.

Now it’s time to clean the system settings of your computer. To do this, copy-paste each of the next items in the Start Menu, hit Enter to access the location/settings that they correspond to, and then complete the instructions shown for each of them:

Ncpa.cpl – In this window, you will see one or several network icons – find and right-click on the one that represents the network you normally connect your PC to, then open Properties and double-click the item labelled Internet Protocol Version 4. In the next window, the following two options must be enabled:

• Obtain an IP address automatically
• Obtain DNS server address automatically

Check them if they are currently not enabled and then move on to Advanced, where you must click the DNS tab, and delete anything shown in the DNS server addresses list. Finally, remember to save the changes you’ve made by clicking the OK button on every window.

Msconfig – When you open this, you will be brought to the System Configuration window, where you must click on Startup, and search for Browser Assistant in the startup items list. If you see it there, uncheck it and click Apply. Also, look for other unfamiliar/suspicious entries and entries with unknown developers (see the manufacturer column) and uncheck those as well, after which select OK.

notepad %windir%/system32/Drivers/etc/hosts – In the notepad file (named Hosts) that opens, scroll down and look at what (if anything) is written after the second “Localhost” line. Normally, nothing should be there, but if you see any questionable IP addresses listed there, you must tell us what they are by copy-pasting them in the comments below. We will review them soon after you send them to us and tell you if they are from the Trojan, in which case you’d need to delete them from Hosts.

Regedit.exe – Before you are allowed to open this app/tool, you will probably be asked whether you’re certain you want to give it permission to make changes to the system – click Yes, but be warned that you must be very cautious with anything you delete here because if you remove something you shouldn’t, the system may encounter different problems, some of which may not be easily fixed.

Once the Registry Editor window appears, click the Edit menu from the top and open Find. A search bar will appear and in it, you must type Browser Assistant, and then launch the search for related items. Any item that gets found must be deleted, but since the search will show you only one related item at a time, you must always repeat the search after each item you delete to make sure there aren’t more of them in the Registry.

After you’ve removed everything and no more results are being found, use the left panel and expand the folders in it to navigate to these three:

• HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software
• HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run
• HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Internet Explorer/Main

In them, look for keys (sub-folders) that appear to be out of place due to having strange, randomly-generated names – something like this, for instance: “0923r3890j98t4203e98tue0938”. Since you can’t be sure that any such item is actually related to the malware, we recommend first telling us about anything suspicious you may find, and then we will let you know if it ought to be deleted.

Once you are done with this final step, remember to try to uninstall Browser Assistant from Control Panel > Uninstall a Program if the first time you attempted that, the rogue program didn’t get removed.

If the malware is still present in the system

Sometimes, Trojans can get embedded too deep within a system, and it could be really difficult to get rid of everything related to them using manual methods. For such instances, it’s best to use a trusted removal tool that can find and eradicate every last bit of malicious data from your system. There are many such tools that can help you in this situation but one that we’ve tested and that is proven to consistently take care of Trojan Horse infections is the one that you’ve probably already noticed linked in the guide. Our recommendation is to give it a go if you are still struggling with the removal of Browser Assistant even after completing every step from the guide.