Remove Def-browser Pop-up Ads — How to Fix Gude

Written by Wilbur Woodham
Def-browser pop-up alerts may appear out of the blue, covering the subject of the website you checked or opening your browser when you don’t desire it to be opened.

Clicking on the Def-browser promotion can result in the injection of other malware or unwanted programs. In this post, you will see the guide of Def-browser popups removal in multiple ways, and also checking your computer for additional viruses presence.

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What are Def-browser pop-ups?

Def-browser popups are an outcome of adware presence. Adware is a sort of malware that presents you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click ads, which produces a large volume of revenue for adware distributors. These advertisements might include sometimes shocking material, or have a link to harmful content/website, due to the fact that adware maintainers have no purpose to inspect the goodness of the content they are going to show – their solitary target is cash.

Def-browser push notification

Def-browser push notification.

Pop-up advertising itself is an excellent, affordable and very effective marketing method1. It allows the vendor to link the customers’ interest to their website, and the customers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they wish to buy. When the person will receive a pop-up alert that the TV set he wishes to purchase is provided at the online store he/she saw previously with a 15% price cut, one will surely use this chance and purchase it. Taking into consideration the very small cost for the popups and their targeting, such an advertising and marketing instrument is a favourite thing amidst the marketing departments of huge internet stores.

Nevertheless, such a rewarding plan could not be missed by virus developers. Ability to show the popup ads by force to the targets of malware invasion is an ideal basis for malicious manipulations with the popup advertisements. And Def-browser.com ads is among hundreds that are “employed” in this system.

Here is a info for the Def-browser site
Site Def-browser.com
Hosting AS59253 Leaseweb Asia Pacific pte. ltd.
Singapore, Singapore
Infection Type Adware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address 23.106.248.15
Symptoms Annoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behavior Steno, Demonus, Demoneu
Fix Tool
To remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the Def-browser virus?

There are a huge amount of ways of getting contaminated by the adware that result in the Def-browser popups storm. A lion’s part of this malware instances is after the free software or cracked programs, that are spread on the peering networks. Freeware may likewise be downloaded from the official site, and the adware is presented as a legit bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A plenty of people oftentimes work with the unreliable programs from untrusted sources: abandonware, various utilities that are free, and even hacked programs. All of these sorts of applications are dangerous, because it is quite easy to include a Def-browser malware under the guise of part of the license hacking script, or as a component of the self-made algoritm within the Windows optimization tool.

Def-browser popup virus may additionally be hidden in the ad somewhere on the odd website. Such sites are typically loaded with colorful and blinking ads, and their proprietors typically permit any promos to be posted on their web page. Therefore, clicking on such banners is a risky thing: only the ad contractor realizes what will occur when you click this ad. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or unwanted programs, you may likewise get something far more risky, like ransomware or coin miner; the substantial share of coin miners circulation is exactly after the malicious promotions.

People dislike popups

The statistic shows that people dislike popup advertising more than other types of promotions

Potentially undesirable programs, like Def-browser pop-up virus may provoke a variety of different problems on your personal computer. Distracting is not the single problem – pop-up notifications can present you the ads, where you are offered to download one more unknown program, or “a perfect anti-malware tool”. Scareware is usually spread under the last slogun. Potentially undesirable programs, in turn, can have spyware functions. And it is very hard to distinguish the unwanted app from a legit one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the potentially unwanted programs and dubious antiviruses, popup-related advertisements are also chosen as a distribution way by different trojan viruses, for example – coin miners. The consequences of activity of such viruses is 100% unwanted, and can cost you several hundreds of dollars. And even if you are not interacting with these advertisements, they can be clicked by someone who also makes use of your personal computer – parents, children, spouse, etc. So the situation may become much more serious, and it will be much harder to deal with it without data loss. It is recommended to remove the viruses with anti-malware programs as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of Def-browser pop-up advertisements?

The manual of Def-browser adware elimination includes 2 parts. First, we need to remove the malware, and afterwards fix the effects of its activity. The elimination task is pretty simple, since it can be done even with the use of Microsoft Defender – security program that is present on all computers with Windows 8/10. Nevertheless, because of its huge resources consumption, along with some failures that may be critical for some groups of individuals, Defender is often disabled by the users, so its use is likely impossible. Furthermore, a wide range of trojan viruses can shut off the embedded antivirus. It is far better to use the separated program that will not have such exposures.

I would certainly suggest you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware2 – a well-proven security device that will undoubtedly eliminate the malware from your system and also create an invulnerable cover with a Proactive protection function. But let’s handle Def-browser adware first.

Removing Def-browser popup virus with GridinSoft Anti-Malware

  • Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware. After the installation, you will be offered to perform the Standard Scan. Approve this action.
  • Gridinsoft Anti-Malware during the scan process

  • Standard scan checks the logical disk where the system files are stored, together with the files of programs you have already installed. The scan lasts up to 6 minutes.
  • GridinSoft Anti-Malware scan results

  • When the scan is over, you may choose the action for each detected virus. For all files of Def-browser malware the default option is “Delete”. Press “Apply” to finish the malware removal.
  • GridinSoft Anti-Malware - After Cleaning

Now, when the computer is clean of viruses, we can proceed to the browser reset. You can do this step manually, as well as with the use of GridinSoft Anti-Malware.

Reset browser settings to default

Manual method of browser reset

To reset Edge, do the following steps :
  1. Open “Settings and more” tab in upper right corner, then find here “Settings” button. In the appeared menu, choose “Reset settings” option :
  2. Reseting the Edge browser

  3. After picking the Reset Settings option, you will see the following menu, stating about the settings which will be reverted to original :
For Mozilla Firefox, do the next actions :
  1. Open Menu tab (three strips in upper right corner) and click the “Help” button. In the appeared menu choose “troubleshooting information” :
  2. The first step to revert Mozilla Firefox

  3. In the next screen, find the “Refresh Firefox” option :
  4. The second step of Firefox restoration
    After choosing this option, you will see the next message :
    The last step for Firefox
If you use Google Chrome
  1. Open Settings tab, find the “Advanced” button. In the extended tab choose the “Reset and clean up” button :
  2. In the appeared list, click on the “Restore settings to their original defaults” :
  3. Finally, you will see the window, where you can see all the settings which will be reset to default :
Opera can be reset in the next way
  1. Open Settings menu by pressing the gear icon in the toolbar (left side of the browser window), then click “Advanced” option, and choose “Browser” button in the drop-down list. Scroll down, to the bottom of the settings menu. Find there “Restore settings to their original defaults” option :

  2. After clicking the “Restore settings…” button, you will see the window, where all settings, which will be reset, are shown :

When the browsers are reset, you need to make sure that your web browser will definitely be connected the accurate DNS while connecting to the website you want. Make a text file titled “hosts” on your pc’s desktop, then open it and fill it with the following text3:

# Copyright (c) 1993-2006 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a ‘#’ symbol.
#
# For example:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server
# 38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host
# localhost name resolution is handle within DNS itself.
# 127.0.0.1 localhost
# ::1 localhost

Find the hosts.txt file in C:/Windows/System32/drivers/etc directory. Rename this file to “hosts.old.txt” (to distinguish it from the new one), and then move the file you created on the desktop to this folder. Remove the hosts.old from this folder. Now you have your hosts file as good as new.

Nevertheless, there is one problem that makes the things a lot harder to fix, especially without the anti-malware program. A lot of adware variations that are used to show you the Def-browser pop-up advertisements are adjusting the deep browser setups, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you try to change your browser settings after your machine was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will certainly crash quickly. In certain cases, you will see no crash, but significant lag spike after pushing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 seconds, and afterwards it will be back to the normal, until you attempt to open settings once more.

Reset your browser settings with GridinSoft Anti-Malware

To reset your browser with GridinSoft Anti-Malware, open the Tools tab, and click the “Reset browser settings” button.

Tools tab in GridinSoft Anti-Malware

You can see the list of the options for each browser. By default, they are set up in the manner which fits the majority of users. Press the “Reset” button (lower right corner). In a minute your browser will be as good as new.

Reset Browser Settings tab in GridinSoft Anti-Malware

The browser reset is recommended to perform through the antivirus tool by GridinSoft, because last is also able to reset the HOSTS file without any additional commands.

How to Remove Def-browser Pop-ups?

Name: Def-browser

Description: Def-browser - a lot of users became a target for the pop-up advertisements. I have a lot of friends who literally bombed me with the questions like “how to remove Def-browser.com push notifications?” or “why do Def-browser.com pop-ups keep appearing on Chrome even after AdBlock installation?”. In this article we will show you how to deal with Def-browser pop-ups, which may corrupt your browser’s correct performance, and create a lot of troubles while you are working.

Operating System: Windows

Application Category: Adware

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References

  1. More about pop-up ads on Wikipedia.
  2. GridinSoft Anti-Malware review and the reasons why I suggest it for malware removal.
  3. Official Microsoft guide for hosts file reset.

About the author

Wilbur Woodham

I was a technical writer from early in my career, and consider IT Security one of my foundational skills. I’m sharing my experience here, and I hope you find it useful.

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