Qatrup Ads Removal Guide — How to Fix It?

Written by Wilbur Woodham
Qatrup pop-up notices can appear unexpectedly, covering the post of the website you explored or opening your web browser when you don’t desire it to be opened.

Clicking on the Qatrup advertisement can lead to the injection of different malware or unwanted programs. In this post, you will see the manual of Qatrup popups clearing in a couple of manners, and also examining your system for extra malware existence.

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What are Qatrup pop-ups?

Qatrup popups are a result of adware activity. Adware is a type of malware that shows you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click promotions, which creates a massive volume of profit for adware representatives. These ads may contain explicit composition, or have a link to malicious content/website, due to the fact that adware maintainers have no reason to examine the goodness of the material they are going to show – their solitary target is cash.

Qatrup push notification

Qatrup push notification.

Pop-up marketing itself is a good, low-priced and also really successful marketing method1. It makes it possible for the vendor to attach the customers’ attention to their site, as well as the customers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they want to purchase. When the customer will get a pop-up alert that the TV set he likes to buy is provided at the online shop he/she checked out earlier with a 15% discount, one will certainly use this chance and get it. Considering the very small cost for the popups and their targeting, such an advertising method is a favourite thing among the marketing departments of big online sellers.

However, such a successful system could not be missed by malware creators. Ability to show the popup advertisements by force to the targets of malware invasion is an excellent basis for malicious tricks with the popup advertisements. And Qatrup.com promotions is one of hundreds that are “employed” in this scheme.

Here is a details for the Qatrup
SiteQatrup.com
HostingAS39572 DataWeb Global Group B.V.
Netherlands, Amsterdam
Infection TypeAdware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address185.56.234.205
SymptomsAnnoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behaviorCeleb, Jammennaps, Defenderpage
Fix Tool
To remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the Qatrup virus?

There are a number of methods of getting infected by the adware that trigger the Qatrup popups tornado. A lion’s part of this virus instances is after the free software or cracked programs, that are distributed on the peering networks. Free software may also be downloaded from the official site, and the adware is presented as a legal bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A number of individuals regularly make use of the dubious programs from untrusted providers: abandonware, various tools that are free of cost, or perhaps hacked programs. All of these types of programs are risky, because it is quite simple to integrate a Qatrup malware under the cover of part of the license hacking script, or as a component of the self-made algoritm within the Windows optimization tool.

Qatrup popup virus may additionally be concealed in the ad somewhere on the unusual site. Such web pages are usually full of bright and blinking ads, and their owners often accept any promotions to be published on their page. Therefore, clicking on such banners is a shot in the dark: only the advertisement provider knows what will occur when you click this ad. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or unwanted programs, you may also receive something a lot more unsafe, like ransomware or coin miner; the big share of coin miners distribution is exactly after the malicious ads.

People dislike popups

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

Potentially undesirable applications, like Qatrup pop-up virus can cause a lot of troubles on your personal computer. Distracting is not the single problem – pop-ups may display you the advertisements, where you are offered to get another strange program, or “a amazing anti-malware tool”. Scareware is often spread with the last motto. Potentially unwanted programs, in turn, may have spyware functions. And it is pretty hard to distinguish the undesirable app from a normal one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the potentially unwanted programs and fake antiviruses, popup-related advertisements 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 ads, they may be clicked by whoever 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 solve it without data and money loss. It is recommended to eliminate the viruses with antivirus programs as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of Qatrup pop-up advertisements?

The guide of Qatrup adware elimination consists of 2 sections. First, we need to deal with the malware, and then fix the consequences of its action. The removal procedure is really easy, due to the fact that it may be executed even with the use of Microsoft Defender – anti-malware software that is available on all computers with Windows 8/10. Nonetheless, as a result of its significant resources utilization, along with some defects that can be serious for some kinds of users, Defender is oftentimes disabled by the users, so its utilization is likely impossible. Additionally, a wide range of trojan viruses are able to switch off the embedded antivirus. It is better to make use of the separated program that will not have such weakness.

I would certainly advise you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware2 – a well-proven anti-malware device that will definitely erase the malware from your PC and also create an invulnerable cover with a Proactive protection function. However, let’s deal with Qatrup adware initially.

Removing Qatrup 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 Qatrup 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 connect the appropriate DNS while connecting to the website you want. Create a text file named “hosts” on your desktop, then open it and fill it with the following lines3:

# 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 trouble that makes things a lot harder to fix, particularly without the anti-malware program. The majority of adware variations that are utilized to show you the Qatrup pop-up promotions are changing the deep browser settings, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you try to change your browser settings after your PC was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will crash soon. In certain cases, you will see no crash, but significant lag spike after pushing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 secs, and then it will be back to the typical, until you try to open settings one more time.

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 Qatrup Pop-ups?

Name: Qatrup

Description: Qatrup - 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 Qatrup.com push notifications?” or “why do Qatrup.com pop-ups keep appearing on Chrome even after AdBlock installation?”. In this article we will show you how to deal with Qatrup 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 advertisements on Wikipedia.
  2. GridinSoft Anti-Malware review 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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