Home Malware Programs Adware BrowserMe

BrowserMe

Posted: January 20, 2017

Threat Metric

Threat Level: 9/10
Infected PCs: 32
First Seen: January 20, 2017
OS(es) Affected: Windows

BrowserMe is a stealthy adware application that may run on a computer without giving the user any hints that there's something fishy going on. This is because unlike most adware, BrowserMe does not rely on visible advertisements that will annoy the users whenever they attempt to navigate the Web. Instead, BrowserMe is programmed to launch silent background copies of Google Chrome, which load a set of pre-defined URL addresses automatically. The instances of Google Chrome that BrowserMe launches are not visible and users will only find out about them if they see multiple Google Chrome processes, even though they are not using the Web browser at the moment. The ads that BrowserMe opens are not unsafe, and the adware does not have the ability to download any content from the ad pages, so users who have BrowserMe on their computers are not at risk of being infected with more severe threats.

Apart from the interesting way this adware uses to generate page views, its authors also have decided to adopt a pretty different distribution campaign. Instead of advertising it as a particularly useful extension, they promote it via manipulated Web pages that show scrambled images in the place of text. Then, the page displays a pop-up that tells users that their browser does not support certain fonts, and they need to download the file 'Chrome_Font.exe' to view the page properly. More experienced users might be able to recognize that this is a tactic, but more naive users would not hesitate to install the Chrome_Font.exe file in hopes that they'll improve their Web browsing experience. However, instead of installing Chrome fonts, the executable file will deploy the BrowserMe adware.

Although BrowserMe is not threatening, the excessive number of Google Chrome processes it launches may impair a computer's performance severely by loading various pages and draining hardware and network resources constantly. The best way to deal with BrowserMe is to use a credible and up-to-date anti-malware scanner since this is the most efficient way to make sure that every last component of BrowserMe will be erased permanently.

Technical Details

File System Modifications

Tutorials: If you wish to learn how to remove malware components manually, you can read the tutorials on how to find malware, kill unwanted processes, remove malicious DLLs and delete other harmful files. Always be sure to back up your PC before making any changes.

The following files were created in the system:



Chrome_Font.exe File name: Chrome_Font.exe
File type: Executable File
Mime Type: unknown/exe
Group: Malware file
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