Discovertoday Virus

Browser Hijacker
by Violet George
January 11, 2023
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Discovertoday

Discovertoday is a type of software that experts classify as a browser hijacker. A browser hijacker like Discovertoday can infiltrate Chrome, Firefox or other popular browsers and flood them with online ads.

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In fact, one of the first symptoms of an infection of this type is the rapid influx of online ads that appear to be overcrowding your browsing program. They come in all shapes and sizes, too, including box messages, banners, popups and even links within plain text.

Another common symptom that browser hijacker victims often complain about is the annoying page redirects that always take place out of the blue. They can send you to various sponsored pages and even open new tabs or browser windows, which can put a strain on just about anyone’s patience. In addition, Discovertoday can also replace your browser homepage and substitute your default search engine with its own. All of this is more than enough reason to want to remove the annoying hijacker from your computer. And we have a removal guide posted below to help you do just that. But stick around until the end of this short article to find out what other hidden aspects there are to this software.

The Discovertoday virus

The above advertising activities tend to throw most users completely off balance and they start panicking thinking that their machine has been infected by the Discovertoday virus. This is not the case and the Discovertoday virus is most certainly not a malicious program.

SUMMARY:

NameDiscovertoday
TypeBrowser Hijacker
Detection Tool

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Please follow all the steps below in order to remove Discovertoday!

How to remove Discovertoday

  1. First, click the Start Menu on your Windows PC.
  2. Type Programs and Settings in the Start Menu, click the first item, and find Discovertoday in the programs list that would show up.
  3. Select Discovertoday from the list and click on Uninstall.
  4. Follow the steps in the removal wizard.

What we suggest you do first is, check the list of programs that are presently installed on the infected device and uninstall any rogue software that you find there:

  • From the Start Menu, navigate to Control Panel ->>> Programs and Features ->>> Uninstall a Program.
  • Next, carefully search for unfamiliar programs or programs that have been installed recently and could be related to Discovertoday.
  • If you find any of the programs suspicious then uninstall them if they turn out to be linked to Discovertoday.
  • If a notification appears on your screen when you try to uninstall a specific questionable program prompting you to just alter it or repair it, make sure you choose NO and complete the steps from the removal wizard.

Remove Discovertoday from Chrome

  1. Click on the three dots in the right upper corner
  2. Go to more tools
  3. Now select extensions
  4. Remove the Discovertoday extension
  • Once you open Chrome, click on the three-dots icon to open the browser’s menu, go to More Tools/ More Options, and then to Extensions.
  • Again, find the items on that page that could be linked to Discovertoday and/or that might be causing problems in the browser and delete them.
  • Afterwards, go to this folder: Computer > C: > Users > *Your User Account* > App Data > Local > Google > Chrome > User Data. In there, you will find a folder named Default – you should change its name to Backup Default and restart the PC.
  • Note that the App Data folder is normally hidden so you’d have to first make the hidden files and folders on your PC visible before you can access it.

How to get rid of Discovertoday on FF/Edge/etc.

  1. Open the browser and select the menu icon.
  2. From the menu, click on the Add-ons button.
  3. Look for the Discovertoday extension
  4. Get rid of Discovertoday by removing it from extensions

If using Firefox:

  • Open Firefox
  • Select the three parallel lines menu and go to Add-ons.
  • Find the unwanted add-on and delete it from the browser – if there is more than one unwanted extension, remove all of them.
  • Go to the browser menu again, select Options, and then click on Home from the sidebar to the left.
  • Check the current addresses for the browser’s homepage and new-tab page and change them if they are currently set to address(es) you don’t know or trust.

If using MS Edge/IE:

  • Start Edge
  • Select the browser menu and go to Extensions.
  • Find and uninstall any Edge extensions that look undesirable and unwanted.
  • Select Settings from the browser menu and click on Appearance.
  • Check the new-tab page address of the browser and if it has been modified by “Discovertoday” or another unwanted app, change it to an address that you’d want to be the browser’s new-tab page.

How to Delete Discovertoday

  1. Open task manager
  2. Look for the Discovertoday process
  3. Select it and click on End task
  4. Open the file location to delete Discovertoday
  • Access the Task Manager by pressing together the Ctrl + Alt + Del keys and then selecting Task Manager.
  • Open Processes and there try to find a process with the name of the unwanted software. If you find it, select it with the right button of the mouse and click on the Open File Location option.
  • If you don’t see a “Discovertoday” process in the Task Manager, look for another suspicious process with an unusual name. It is likely that the unwanted process would be using lots of RAM and CPU so pay attention to the number of resources each process is using.
  • Tip: If you think you have singled out the unwanted process but are not sure, it’s always a good idea to search for information about it on the Internet – this should give you a general idea if the process is a legitimate one from a regular program or from your OS or if it is indeed likely linked to the adware.
  • If you find another suspicious process, open its File Location too.
  • Once in the File Location folder for the suspicious process, start testing all of the files that are stored there by dragging them to our free online scanner available below.
  • Each file will be scanned with up to 64 antivirus programs to ensure maximum accuracy
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    • If the scanner finds malware in any of the files, return to the Processes tab in the Task Manager, select the suspected process, and then select the End Process option to quit it.
    • Go back to the folder where the files of that process are located and delete all of the files that you are allowed to delete. If all files get deleted normally, exit the folder and delete that folder too. If one or more of the files showed an error message when you tried to delete them, leave them for now and return to try to delete them again once you’ve completed the rest of the guide.

    How to Uninstall Discovertoday

    1. Click on the home button
    2. Search for Startup Apps
    3. Look for Discovertoday in there
    4. Uninstall Discovertoday from Startup Apps by turning it off
    • Now you need to carefully search for and uninstall any Discovertoday-related entries from the Registry. The easiest way to do this is to open the Registry Editor app (type Regedit in the windows search field and press Enter) and then open a Find dialog (CTRL+F key combination) where you have to type the name of the threat. 
    • Perform a search by clicking on the Find Next button and delete any detected results. Do this as many times as needed until no more results are found. 
    • After that, to ensure that there are no remaining entries lined to Discovertoday in the Registry, go manually to the following directories and delete them:
    • HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Random Directory. 
    • HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run/Random
    • HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Internet Explorer/Main/Random

    Is Discovertoday dangerous?


    However, software of this type does have the inclination to engage in various unsavory activities, such as monitoring your browsing preferences and keeping track of the type of content you interact with online. This information is stored and analyzed in order to adjust the displayed ads on your screen accordingly and thus ensure more effective exposure for certain products and services. In addition, this is also how the developers of this software earn revenue – through PPC and PPV remuneration systems. But the gathered browsing data may also be sold to third parties for an additional profit, which you may or may not have consented to.
    Other potential traps that a program like Discovertoday or Realsrv.com could have in store for you have to do with the numerous page redirects we mentioned above. You could possibly end up on infected or unsecure websites that may land you infections with genuine malware like Trojan horse viruses, ransomware and worms. You can even have your system contaminated as a result of clicking on an infected online ad. Hence, it’s a good idea to steer clear of all the endless popups and blinking notifications that come your way while you’re browsing the web.
    But the best course of action is of course simply removing Discovertoday from your computer entirely, together with all the unwanted changes it has introduced. This will also save you from potential browser crashes and system malfunctions that could result from your machine being overloaded with all the background processes that this hijacker could be running.


    About the author

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    Violet George

    Violet is an active writer with a passion for all things cyber security. She enjoys helping victims of computer virus infections remove them and successfully deal with the aftermath of the attacks. But most importantly, Violet makes it her priority to spend time educating people on privacy issues and maintaining the safety of their computers. It is her firm belief that by spreading this information, she can empower web users to effectively protect their personal data and their devices from hackers and cybercriminals.

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