How to remove Goalmedia.bar pop-ups? — Fix Guide

Written by Wilbur Woodham
Goalmedia.bar pop-up alerts can appear unexpectedly, covering the post of the page you visited or opening your browser when you don’t want it to be opened.

Clicking the Goalmedia.bar advertisement may trigger the injection of different malware or unwanted programs. In this post, you will see the guide of Goalmedia.bar popups clearing in multiple manners, as well as inspecting your personal computer for additional viruses presence.

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What are Goalmedia.bar pop-ups?

Goalmedia.bar popups are a result of adware action. Adware is a sort of malware that demonstrates to you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click ads, which produces a massive volume of revenue for adware distributors. These ads may have sometimes shocking content, or have a link to malicious content/website, because adware maintainers have no reason to check the goodness of the material they are going to show – their single target is money.

Goalmedia.bar push notification

Goalmedia.bar push notification.

Pop-up advertising itself is a good, low-priced and really efficient marketing method1. It allows the seller to attach the customers’ interest to their website, and the buyers to receive the dynamic updates on the goods they want to buy. When the consumer will get a pop-up notification that the TV set he desires to buy is provided at the online shop he/she saw previously with a 15% price cut, one will certainly use this opportunity and purchase it. Taking into consideration the extremely small cost for the popups and their targeting, such an advertising tool is a much-loved thing amidst the advertising teams of large internet retail stores.

However, such a successful plan could not be missed by malware creators. Option to show the popup advertisements forcibly to the targets of malware invasion is an excellent basis for evil-minded adjustments with the popup ads. And Goalmedia.bar promotions is just one of hundreds that are “employed” in this scheme.

Here is a details for the Goalmedia.bar site
Site Goalmedia.bar
Hosting AS14061 DigitalOcean, LLC
Netherlands, Amsterdam
Infection Type Adware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address 178.62.225.201
Symptoms Annoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behavior Pplyforthe, Adsymptotic, Vacancyth
Fix Tool
To remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the Goalmedia.bar virus?

There are a plenty of methods of getting contaminated by the adware that result in the Goalmedia.bar popups storm. A lion’s part of this computer virus cases is after the free software or cracked programs, that are distributed on the peering networks. Freeware can also be downloaded from the main website, and the adware is offered as a legal bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A number of individuals frequently work with the unreliable programs from untrusted sources: abandonware, various tools that are free of cost, or even hacked programs. Every one of these kinds of software are dangerous, since it is quite easy to integrate a Goalmedia.bar malware under the cover of part of the license hacking script, or as a component of the self-made algoritm inside of the Windows optimization tool.

Goalmedia.bar popup malware may additionally be concealed in the ad somewhere on the odd web page. Such sites are typically filled with bright and blinking advertisements, and their proprietors typically accept any type of promos to be posted on their web page. Thus, clicking such banners is a shot in the dark: only the advertisement provider knows what will occur when you press this ad. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or unwanted programs, you can additionally receive something a lot more dangerous, like ransomware or coin miner; the big share of coin miners distribution is exactly after the malicious promotions.

People dislike popups

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

Potentially unwanted programs, like Goalmedia.bar pop-up virus can cause a lot of troubles on your PC. Distracting is not the single problem – pop-up notifications can display you the promotions, where you are offered to get one more strange program, or “a perfect security tool”. Scareware is often spread with the use of the last slogun. Potentially unwanted programs, in turn, can have spyware functions. And it is pretty hard to distinguish the undesirable app from a good one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the potentially unwanted programs and fake antiviruses, popup-related ads are also used as a spreading way by different trojan viruses, for example – coin miners. The consequences of activity of such malware is 100% unpleasant, and can cost you hundreds of dollars. And even if you are not tapping these promotions, they may be clicked by someone who also makes use of your personal computer – parents, children, spouse, etc. So the things may become much more serious, and it will be much harder to deal with it without data loss. It is recommended to wipe out the viruses with anti-malware programs as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of Goalmedia.bar pop-up advertisements?

The guide of Goalmedia.bar adware clearing contains 2 parts. First, we need to deal with the malware, and then repair the effects of its action. The removal process is quite simple, since it may be done even with the use of Microsoft Defender – security software that is present on all computers with Windows 8/10. However, because of its significant resources usage, along with some errors that can be pivotal for some types of individuals, Defender is frequently turned off by the users, so its use is likely impossible. Furthermore, a variety of trojan viruses are able to disable the embedded antivirus. It is better to make use of the separated program that will not have such vulnerabilities.

I’d advise you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware2 – a well-proven anti-malware device that will definitely eliminate the malware from your computer and also create an invulnerable cover with a Proactive protection feature. However, let’s manage Goalmedia.bar adware initially.

Removing Goalmedia.bar 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 Goalmedia.bar 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 web browsers are reset, you need to make sure that your browser will be connected the appropriate DNS while connecting to the website you want. Make a text file named “hosts” on your computer’s desktop, then open it and fill it with the following content3:

# 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.

However, there is one problem that makes things a lot harder to restore, especially without the anti-malware program. A lot of adware variants that are utilized to show you the Goalmedia.bar pop-up promotions are altering the deep browser settings, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you attempt to change your browser settings after your system was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will certainly collapse soon. Sometimes, you will see no crash, but large lag spike after pushing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 secs, and afterwards it will be back to the normal, until you attempt to open settings once again.

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 Goalmedia.bar Pop-ups?

Name: Goalmedia.bar

Description: Goalmedia.bar - 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 Goalmedia.bar push notifications?” or “why do Goalmedia.bar pop-ups keep appearing on Chrome even after AdBlock installation?”. In this article we will show you how to deal with Goalmedia.bar 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 overview and the reasons why I recommend 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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