MacKeeper

Hello. I am new here and I hope I am in the correct forum! My question is regarding the insidious MacKeeper ads and pop-ups. How do I get rid of them? We have had a Mac for many years and have never seen anything like this. We have not downloaded the program so that is not an issue - at least I don't think so. I am in those old age years (70+) and may not be using the correct terms, so please bear with me! Thank you!

Welcome to Mac-Forums..

In which browser and site are you seeing these ads and pop-ups? You should be running minimally the Adblock Plus extension on your browser, I'd couple that with Flashblock and Ghostery to get the trifecta of extensions necessary to deal with unwanted ads, pop-ups and content on ALL sites..

I get them in Safari, Chrome and Firefox. OK! I have located the extensions for Safari, (didn't know I had those. Never checked "extensions" out!). I see Adblock but not the other 2. Google? I appreciate your help! Never stop learning!

Ashwin: I just wanted to clarify the situation ~ I may not have stated the problem correctly. The website for Mackeeper as well as other sites and ads for IObit, Detox my Mac, and a bunch of others continually just come up out of nowhere. When I enter a web address I am instantly sent to these websites and sometimes multiple websites "stream"by before settling on one of the sites above. It is like I have no control over where the browser is taking me. I did install Adblock and it still happens. Could this be a virus?

There might be multiple things in play here. If you just have pop-ups that appear from various sites or ads that automatically start playing. The extensions I mentioned should catch them and squash them. You can choose to allow certain sites to play flash all the time with Flashblock but that's seldom necessary since you can always click on the blocked flash (video or what have you) to play it on demand..

If your browser is being redirected to other sites when you search or something, that's known as a browser hijack and requires a different tactic to be dealt with.

For starters, clear the cookies and cache on all of your browser using the instructions here: https://kb.iu.edu/d/ahic

Next, open up the terminal (Applications->Utilities->Terminal) and enter the following command at the prompt

This will dump any state data in your DNS (Dynamic Name Service) so that you are not be redirected to places you didn't intend to go to. Close the terminal by hitting CMD+q.

Next, hit CMD+SHIFT+g to get the Go To Folder dialog and enter "/etc" in there. You will get a Finder window. Scroll down to find the hosts file. Right click on that file and choose Open With -> TextEdit and look at the contents, you want it to be similar to

##
# Host Database
#
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting. Do not change this entry.
##
127.0.0.1 localhost
255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
::1 localhost
fe80::1%lo0 localhost

Click to expand...

If not, report back and we'll try to fix that up. Let's start with this and see where it takes us.

The links to the 3 extensions for Safari, Chrome and FireFox are below for your convenience..

Adblock for Safari: https://extensions.apple.com/details/?id=com.betafish.adblockforsafari-UAMUU4S2D9
Adblock Plus for Chrome: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/adblock-plus/cfhdojbkjhnklbpkdaibdccddilifddb?hl=en
Adblock Plus for Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/adblock-plus/
ClickToFlash for Safari: https://extensions.apple.com/details/?id=com.hoyois.safari.clicktoflash-GY5KR7239Q
Flashblock for Chrome: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/flashblock/gofhjkjmkpinhpoiabjplobcaignabnl?hl=en
Flashblock for FireFox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/flashblock/
Ghostery for Safari: https://extensions.apple.com/details/?id=com.betteradvertising.ghostery-HPY23A294X
Ghostery for Chrome: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ghostery/mlomiejdfkolichcflejclcbmpeaniij?hl=en
Ghostery for FireFox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ghostery/

OK. Did all that and it looks good. Thank you for the links! I will report back it this doesn't work! I appreciate your help Ashwin!

I'm back again. OMG! Now I have even more websites that are invading Safari. These are totally new and are in addition to the original ones. What should I try now?!

I use adblock and ghostery (I only use safari as a browser) and do not get any adverts.

are you sure you've activated them? click on safari, then preferences, then extensions and make sure you've toggled the extensions to on.

also, while you're in safari preferences, go to the security tab and make sure you've ticked the box to block pop up windows

hijacked AGAIN

I have done all that and the extensions were on and the box was checked to block pop-ups. I just got sent to 3 different websites while trying to get to this page! HELP! This problem seems to be growing exponentially.

I am still getting pop-up ads despite using adblock. I was just rerouted to another website while trying to type this reply.

Would Norton Power Eraser be good?

I wouldn't use that.

You could try this:

Download and install the "The Safe Adware Removal App" from here:

The Safe Mac » Adware Removal Tool

(courtesy of CHSAG on a recent thread)

Make sure you read and follow the instructions

Actually, I don't think there is a Norton Power Eraser for Macs. So, I did check out the removal tool you suggested but was totally freaked out about doing any downloading. What I did do, was turn off all the extensions I found which included Searchme and conduit search. It also disabled Adblock but I will worry about that later. Good grief! I thought Macs were safe from all this! Now I will see if this works!

it might look complex but if you follow the instructions then it does what it says - safely removes adware.

it sounds like you have 2 unwanted extensions in searchme and conduit search - you want to be deleting / uninstalling these and then turning adblock and the others back on.

Marcy McPike said:

Good grief! I thought Macs were safe from all this!

Click to expand...

Our Macs are quite safe from most nastiness, but no machine is safe from social engineering trickery. Those extensions are on your machine because someone using the machine allowed them to be installed.

ron4mac:

I understand those extensions are on my mac because either my husband or I unwittingly "allowed" them to be installed. We certainly didn't intend to install them at all. When I said I thought macs were "safe", I meant from all the reading I have done, I have gathered that our mac, ( IMAC 19" 2007 with OS 10.9.4 [Maverick] and, yes, it is ancient) has built in protection against viruses(?), malware(?) and other unscrupulous "stuff". I am just going by what I have read. I am far from being computer literate compared to you folks, so maybe I am not explaining my problem in the correct terms. When using Safari, Chrome and Firefox, we are being "redirected" to many different websites. Is that the same as being "hijacked"? Is there any way to stop this from happening? This is what I have done so far:

Emptied cache
Erased history
Uninstalled unwanted extensions
Reset Safari
Shutdown and restarted Safari
I also did as RazOrEdge suggested.

We have no antivirus programs installed. "Social engineering trickery?"
Thanks

Marcy McPike said:

"Social engineering trickery?"

Click to expand...

Marcy, that is when something is presented to you and you are asked to perform some action and, although there is really no reason why you should take the action, you do it anyway because it was presented in such a compelling way to you that it seemed (in the moment) like the right thing to do.

I think your best bet here is to download and run the Adware Removal Tool (as recommended by nickyr). The Safe Mac » Adware Removal Tool

Or, if you feel confident enough to traipse around the innards of your Mac, the same website has instructions for manually removing the adware items that the tool automatically removes for you.

[ BTW: This message is NOT social engineering trickery ]

Well, after trying to figure out what all this means, maybe my only resort is to buy a new mac! Will this take care of these problems? My mac innards are very scary to me since I am paranoid about messing up things even more. I will try the Safe Mac Adware Removal Tool as you suggested, but if it doesn't resolve the problems, the new mac is the answer!!!

Well, a new Mac is always nice, but if you do with it what you did with the current one, you'll end up in the same fix. You need to figure out HOW you got to this point or you'll just be here again.

hey i can simply answer this.

Mackeeper and others like this there own popup's are malware even if you didn't intend to install them if you don't block them you have some issues