Guffins Toolbar

The Guffins Toolbar is a search engine hijacker that redirects its users to Ask.com, a search site promoted by a large number of diverse browser toolbars and other add-ons. Ask.com isn't considered a compromised site, but malware researchers find no benefits to allowing the Guffins Toolbar to determine your choice of search engine and suggest deleting the Guffins Toolbar for your browser's safety. Because Ask.com toolbars rarely may remove all of their browser modifications during uninstallation, the use of anti-malware products may be required to prevent any leftover system changes of a Guffins Toolbar installation from continuing to hijack your browser even once the toolbar has been removed.

Taking the MacGuffin Pet for a Walk

The Guffins Toolbar, named for the virtual pet game promoted on its website, is a bundled program including with playing the game. While malware researchers haven't found any other suspicious content on this pet-friendly site, they have taken notice of the Guffins Toolbar's use as a browser hijacker. While you're engaged in walking your virtual pet, the Guffins Toolbar takes your browser for a walk: by implementing search engine hijacks and homepage hijacks that ignore your default browser settings and redirect you to Ask.com. For its part, Ask.com, is a toolbar-promoted search site that's associated with an almost limitless horde of PUPs and browser hijackers.

Contact with Ask.com or even searches through it should be safe, as long as your browser is equipped with appropriate protection from attacks by any third party sources. However, Ask.com's searches are not necessarily superior to those of reputable search sites that don't hijack your browser, and malware experts find that removing the Guffins Toolbar is the best choice for keeping a firm grip on your Web browser's behavior.

Sending the Guffins Toolbar to the Pound

Although the merits of Guffins.com's pet simulation game may be debated, the functions of the Guffins Toolbar always are overall negatives for your browser and PC. Many Ask.com toolbars include uninstallation options but fail to delete all of their settings changes by default, which makes anti-malware products the most convenient option for deleting a Guffins Toolbar and also stopping your browser from suffering through any future Ask.com-hijacking problems. As a general rule, the classification of browser add-ons of any brand that 'offer' to modify your search or homepage settings is suspicious or, in some cases, even threatening.

The Guffins Toolbar is one of the more harmless-looking of many toolbars interested in promoting Ask.com. Because you'll always need to be on the watch for new members of Ask.com's toolbar family, malware researchers can point to many examples of just how varied these PUPs may get with similar PC threats like the Daily Bible Guide Toolbar, the FilmFanatic Toolbar, the Music Box Toolbar, the Movies Toolbar, the WeatherBlink Toolbar, and the Allin1Convert Toolbar.

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