Joe’s Firefox has been hijacked by Ask.com
My firefox browser has been Taken over by something called ASK I cannot remove ASK in the control panel. HELP.
Our answer
Hi Joe. Ask is part of the FunWebProducts family of scumware. This scumbag family consists of such things as SmileyCentral, Webfetti, MyWay, iWon, Ask, and about fifteen other spyware/adware hijackers. You probably got Ask from a download which was bundled with Ask. No one in their right mind would ever download Ask. Ask used to be Ask Jeeves before the Interactive scumware corporation bought it and took the butler away.
If you just noticed Ask hijacking your browser, the surest way to divest yourself of it is to do a system restore – back to a time before you were infected with Ask. If it’s been more than a few weeks your best bet would be to use Malwarebytes. The freeware version will clean the Ask infection just fine. The link we provide is for the freeware version – but if you can afford it, get the full version. The full version has real-time scanning which the free version doesn’t. Keep in mind that most antivirus programs won’t remove the Ask.com infection – and that is just what it is — an infection.
Ask is part of Interactive Corp. A company who decided long ago they couldn’t compete with Google, Yahoo and Microsoft – so they turned to ruining people’s computer with garbageware in order to maintain their measly 3% share of the search engine market. It’s pretty bad when you have to infect peoples’ computers with scumware in order to maintain a tiny 3% share.
In a recent search engine market survey – Google was #1 with 65%, Bing (Microsoft) had about 13%, Yahoo had about 12% and Ask had around 3%.
Joe – we caution you (and everyone) to be careful when downloading freeware. Many developers can’t resist when a company such as Ask offers to pay them $1.00 for every download. You can imagine, if you had a popular freeware program that is downloaded a thousand times a day, this would be quite tempting. We have been offered the same kind of thing many times – and we’ve turned every one of them down. That’s why we are broke – but at least we can sleep well in our cardboard boxes at night.
You brought this up some time back and I made a mental note of it then. I have seen not only the search engine listed but also some of their terrible offspring. Thanks to you I am not a victim. I have thanked you in the past and I am thanking you again today. You certainly are appreciated.
Thank you both for keeping us “safe”! If it isn’t recommended by TC or EB, I shy away from it!
Your warning is timely & eternal. Because I was impatient when downloading a program, I did not take time to read the download site fully and did not untick the “Download Ask”. Then I spent quite some time in having to delete it. Please read the instructions & don’t be impatient !
I was wondering..that last line from, you know, our pals, Cloudeight. “That’s why we are broke – but at least we can sleep well in our cardboard boxes at night.” Oh boy! I think I have about half a doz. soppy Scotties..(you know..the tissues)..on my desk. I can’t stand to think of TC & EB huddling together in their cardboard boxes at night. Do you think maybe we should get ourselves together and foster a drive to raise some $$$$’s for these two who have done soooooooo much for us, and still keep right on truckin’ for us?
I wish you would really tell us how you feel…LMBO. Be careful people, just about all downloads now have add-ons like this.
Your Oracle Java update has by default a checked box to download the Ask.com toolbar. You have to un-check it every time you update Java or you will end up with it on your computer. 🙁