Home Malware Programs Potentially Unwanted Programs (PUPs) Search Web

Search Web

Posted: July 27, 2017

Threat Metric

Threat Level: 10/10
Infected PCs: 3,612
First Seen: July 27, 2017
Last Seen: November 19, 2022
OS(es) Affected: Windows

The Search Web is a browser extension, which is offered by Searchsafelp.com. The website found there is rather simple, and all it contains is a snippet of text accompanied by a download button, which is probably supposed to lead users to the Search Web's download page. However, clicking the download button does nothing, and a look at the source code of the page reveals that the link to the Chrome Store is indeed there. This means that the extension was probably removed from the Chrome Store due to violation of the Terms of Service, which will not be a surprise considering that the Search Web is detected as a Potentially Unwanted Program (PUP) by reputable computer security tools.

According to the Search Web's website, this extension is meant to help users by protecting their online privacy and hiding their search queries from marketing companies. It is a wide-known fact that popular search engines like Yahoo, Bing, Google, and others may use the statistics of their users to enhance the quality of their advertising campaigns and other monetization strategies. However, this activity is not harmful certainly, and you can rest assured that extensions like the Search Web will not help you avoid the data mining techniques major search aggregators use.

The installation of the Search Web leads to only one notable change – the extension will modify the Chrome's settings so that the default new tab page and search aggregator might be changed to a search engine associated with the Search Web. Unfortunately, because of the Search Web's deletion from the Chrome Store, security experts are unable to test the extension and see how it performs. However, since the Search Web is categorized as a PUP, our advice is to get rid of it either by manual removal or with the assistance of a credible security tool.

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