Universalsearches.com Removal Guide

One could think that Universalsearches.com is a powerful search engine, which can help in finding anything. Unfortunately, security specialists say that it is yet another browser hijacker that only seeks your clicks. In the words of Universalsearches.com, they “serve website users with the most relevant and highest paying ads.” Clearly, you will not receive any money for clicking on those ads. On the contrary, they might lead you to malicious websites that can infect your computer or invade your privacy. Since this hijacker does not review the sites that it displays, you can never know which one can be dangerous. You should not risk your system’s security for such a useless tool. We advise you to hurry and remove this hijacker from your computer. To do that, just follow the removal steps that are displayed below the article, and continue reading if you want more information on the infection.

This browser hijacker settles on your computer without any permission. In fact, you could have installed it yourself, especially if you have visited any unreliable pages that contain various freeware downloads. Of course, you did not let it in knowingly, because such hijackers as Universalsearches.com are usually installed quietly together with some freeware application. Our researchers found out that Universalsearches.com could be dropped with potentially unwanted programs, such as Picexa. Hence you should try to avoid downloading freeware from unreliable websites in the future if you do not want any more of unwanted programs.

Even if you did not realize that you installed it, you would notice that your homepage, search engine, and the new tab page have been changed to Universalsearches.com on all of the browsers on your computer. As its classification says, it “hijacks” your browser by taking control of its settings. At first, you might not care that much as it looks like a regular search engine that allows you to look for various types of information. However, you will see that this hijacker advertises some third party websites and regularly promotes their services or products to you by injecting your search results with ads and sponsored links. Also, our researchers have noticed that it might deny you access to some websites and so disrupt your browsing.

Universalsearches.com claims that it does not collect any personal information on its Privacy Policy. On the other hand, it displays various advertising links on search results that belong to third party websites. If you click on such links, you might end up on untrustworthy site that might collect your private information without asking. However, Universalsearches.com can gather various keywords that you type in the search, the clicks that you make on ads, and other content. Later on, they send this information to their server and analyze it, so it could prepare targeted ads for you. Such personalized ads can sometimes contain even your name or location; and, as a result, you might be more curious about it and click on it. What is more, such unreliable sites might be dangerous for your computer as it can get infected with worms, viruses, etc. Keep it in mind that various malicious software can enter your system if it is not well protected. Not all of these links might lead you to unreliable websites, but usually users cannot distinguish between decent and fraudulent pages. Hence it is up to you if you want to risk your privacy or your computers security and continue using Universalsearches.com; however, we urge you to use more responsible search engines that do not display third party ads.

We hope that by now you realize that Universalsearches.com is no good for you; we also have no doubt that getting rid of it will be easy as we have prepared removal instructions for you. You have to remove this hijacker from all the browsers that you use if you want to get rid of it completely. If you have any questions about this search engine or its removal, leave us a comment below.

Delete Universalsearches.com manually

Google Chrome

1. Navigate to: C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default.
2. Find and delete these files: Preferences, Secure Preferences, Web Data.

Mozilla Firefox

1. Locate the following path: C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\{Unique Mozilla user ID}.
2. Find file named Prefs.js and open it with Notepad.
3. Locate and delete this line: user_pref("browser.startup.homepage", "http:// Universalsearches.com /").

Internet Explorer

1. Press Windows Key+R.
2. Type regedit and click OK.
3. Locate the following path: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main.
4. Search for Value Name Start Page on the right side.
5. Right-Click on Start Page and select Modify.
6. Replace Value Data with the page you like, e.g. google.com.
7. Click OK.