How to effectively remove CoolWebSearch (CWS) Infection using Trend Micro CWShredder
CoolWebSearch is one of the most difficult, persistent Malware/Spyware infections to hit those online in recent times, since 2003 to be exact. It comes in nearly countless variants, earlier ones are well documented by Merijn - the original developer of CWShredder - in CoolWebSearch Chronicles. The variations of CWS hijacks your browser to the Website called CoolWebSearch.com, which pays affiliates whenever they direct a user to their Website.
The many variants of "CoolWebSearch installs dozens of bookmarks mostly to porn Web sites on your desktop, changes your home page without asking, and continually changes it back if you attempt to correct it. Furthermore, it significantly slows down the performance of your PC, and introduces modifications which cause Microsoft Windows to freeze, crash or randomly reboot". They also normally escape most Anti-Spyware products. However, most known variants of CoolWebsearch can be detected and cleaned by CWShredder.
To check your system for CWS infections:
CWShredder Download from here. Trend Micro CWShredder.
Double click the CWShredder.exe to open the Program and Click on I AGREE to accept the license agreement.
Checkmark the option Move CWS files found to the Recycle Bin instead of deleting them as a precaution. We can empty the Recycle Bin later once the infection is cured.
Click Fix to let the CWShredder look for and fix any CWS infection it finds.
Click OK in the confirmation screen to continue.
CWShredder is scanning your system for known variants of CWS infections.
The results are appended to the bottom of the screen. Click Next to continue.
Click Exit to exit the program.
This concludes the CWShredder Tutorial.
