Sound Booster Malware

Browser Hijacker
by Brandon Skies
November 20, 2022

Sound Booster

Sound Booster is a non-malicious app of the browser hijacker category that can modify the settings of your Chrome, Firefox, Edge or Safari browser and fill your screen with ads. In most cases, Sound Booster will install a search engine of its own and will replace the homepage domain with a sponsored one.

Sound Booster Chrome Extension

You most probably came across this post because this browser hijacker variant has hijacked your default web browser and now you are unable to surf the web in peace. If this is the case, at the end of the article, you will find a removal guide and a trusted professional removal tool that will help you uninstall Sound Booster and remove its unwanted changes. But first, let’s tell you a few more words about this software and its capabilities.

The Sound Booster Chrome Extension

Unfortunately, staying away from the constantly popping up the Sound Booster Chrome Extension ads and links may be a difficult task considering that the browser hijacker is software designed to aggressively promote dozens of them all over the screen. That’s why the most effective way to deal with all those random commercial messages and links is to permanently remove the Sound Booster Chrome Extension.

If you don’t know where to start, we suggest you take a look at the instructions in the removal guide that we have prepared for you below. It contains detailed steps on how to locate Sound Booster and safely delete its components from your Windows system.

SUMMARY:

NameSound Booster
TypeBrowser Hijacker
Danger LevelMedium (nowhere near threats like Ransomware, but still a security risk)
Symptoms You may experience auto-redirects to sites full of aggressive pop-up ads every time you start a new browsing session.
Distribution MethodTypically, most Browser Hijackers get distributed in a bundle with other free apps, browser add-ons, and click-bait ads.
Detection Tool

Please follow all the steps below in order to remove Sound Booster!

How to remove Sound Booster

  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 Sound Booster in the programs list that would show up.
  3. Select Sound Booster 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 Sound Booster.
  • If you find any of the programs suspicious then uninstall them if they turn out to be linked to Sound Booster.
  • 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 Sound Booster 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 Sound Booster 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 Sound Booster 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 Sound Booster 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 Sound Booster extension
  4. Get rid of Sound Booster 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 “Sound Booster” or another unwanted app, change it to an address that you’d want to be the browser’s new-tab page.

How to Delete Sound Booster

  1. Open task manager
  2. Look for the Sound Booster process
  3. Select it and click on End task
  4. Open the file location to delete Sound Booster
  • 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 “Sound Booster” 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 Sound Booster

    1. Click on the home button
    2. Search for Startup Apps
    3. Look for Sound Booster in there
    4. Uninstall Sound Booster from Startup Apps by turning it off
    • Now you need to carefully search for and uninstall any Hostingcloud. racing-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 Sound Booster 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
    What is Sound Booster extension?

    A browser hijacker is a term that typically sounds as scary as a Trojan horse, ransomware or some dreadful virus. In reality, however, this term applies to software that is designed to target users with lots of ads and sponsored redirects. Generally, a browser hijacker is not intended to do harm to a computer. For the most part, this software can only spam the main web browser’s screen with pay-per-click messages. However, a lot of web users who end up with such a browser hijacker in their system may not be able to comfortably put up with the overwhelming number of pop-ups, banners, new tabs and auto-redirects that they may be exposed to. This is one of the reasons why they consider apps like Sound Booster as potentially unwanted and seek for ways to uninstall them from their system as soon as possible.

    Is Sound Booster extension dangerous?

    And when such redirects take place in the web browser, you may naturally face difficulties to browse the web normally and navigate to the pages you actually want to visit. Besides, when auto-redirects happen, the risk of clicking on a misleading link or landing on a website that contains questionable content is always present since you have no control over the pages you land on. For this reason, it is a good idea to avoid interaction with the content that programs like Sound Booster and Parrable.com display in order to prevent a possible encounter with potential carriers of viruses and malware such as the infamous ransomware and Trojans.


    About the author

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    Brandon Skies

    Brandon is a researcher and content creator in the fields of cyber-security and virtual privacy. Years of experience enable him to provide readers with important information and adequate solutions for the latest software and malware problems.

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