Shwfpd Ads Removal Guide — How to Fix It?

Written by Wilbur Woodham
Shwfpd pop-up notifications can appear out of the blue, covering the material of the website you explored or opening your browser when you don’t wish it to be opened.

Clicking the Shwfpd ad can result in the injection of various malware or unwanted programs. In this article, you will see the tutorial of Shwfpd popups clearing in several ways, and also inspecting your computer for extra viruses existence.

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What are Shwfpd pop-ups?

Shwfpd popups are a result of adware presence. Adware is a kind of malware that presents you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click advertisements, which creates a major amount of profit for adware distributors. These ads may have sometimes shocking information, or have a web link to malicious content/website, since adware maintainers have no purpose to inspect the goodness of the web content they are going to reveal – their single target is money.

Shwfpd push notification

Shwfpd push notification.

Pop-up promotions itself is a good, cheap and also extremely effective advertising instrument1. It permits the vendor to link the buyers’ interest to their site, as well as the customers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they wish to purchase. When the person will get a pop-up notification that the TV set he likes to purchase is available at the online shop he/she saw earlier with a 15% discount, one will definitely use this opportunity and get it. Taking into consideration the exceptionally low cost for the popups and their targeting, such a promotion and marketing instrument is a favourite thing amongst the advertising departments of big internet retailers.

Nevertheless, such a profitable plan could not be missed by virus creators. Option to show the popup ads forcibly to the people of malware invasion is an ideal basis for malevolent tricks with the popup advertisements. And Shwfpd.com promotions is just one of hundreds that are “employed” in this system.

Here is a short summary for the Shwfpd site
Site Shwfpd.com
Hosting AS39572 DataWeb Global Group B.V.
Netherlands, Amsterdam
Infection Type Adware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address 185.56.234.205
Symptoms Annoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behavior News, Samplelocation3, Synergynews3
Fix Tool
To remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the Shwfpd virus?

There are a huge amount of ways of becoming contaminated by the adware that create the Shwfpd popups storm. A lion’s part of this computer virus incidents is after the free software or cracked programs, that are distributed on the peering networks. Freeware can additionally be downloaded from the main website, and the adware is delivered as a legitimate bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A number of users frequently work with the uncertain programs from untrusted providers: abandonware, various apps that are free, or even hacked programs. All of these kinds of software are unsafe, since it is extremely simple to build in a Shwfpd 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.

Shwfpd popup malware can likewise be hidden in the advertisement somewhere on the unusual website. Such sites are typically filled with intense and blinking advertisements, and their owners typically approve any kind of promos to be placed on their page. For this reason, clicking such banners is a shot in the dark: only the advertisement provider knows what will occur when you press this advertisement. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or undesirable programs, you can also get something a lot more hazardous, like ransomware or coin miner; the substantial 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 unwanted programs, like Shwfpd popup virus can cause a wide range of troubles on your PC. Distracting is not the only effect – pop-up notifications may show you the promotions, where you are offered to get one more unknown application, or “a effective security tool”. Scareware is usually distributed with the use of the last motto. Potentially unwanted applications, in turn, may have spyware functions. And it is pretty hard to distinguish the unwanted app from a good one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the PUPs and dubious antiviruses, popup-related advertisements are also chosen as a distribution method by different trojan viruses, for instance – coin miners. The consequences of activity of such viruses is 100% unpleasant, and can cost you hundreds of dollars. And even if you are not interacting with these advertisements, they can be clicked by whoever who also makes use of your PC – parents, children, spouse, etc. So the situation can become much more serious, and it will be much harder to deal with it without data and money loss. It is recommended to remove the viruses with anti-malware applications as soon as possible.

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

The tutorial of Shwfpd adware removal consists of 2 parts. Initially, we need to remove the malware, and then deal with the effects of its action. The elimination process is really easy, since it may be executed even with making use of Microsoft Defender – anti-virus tool that is present on all computers with Windows 8/10. Nevertheless, as a result of its large resources consumption, as well as some problems that can be critical for some types of individuals, Defender is frequently disabled by the users, so its utilization is likely impossible. Furthermore, different trojan viruses are able to disable the embedded antivirus. It is better to use the separated program that will not have such vulnerabilities.

I would certainly suggest you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware2 – a well-proven security device that will definitely exterminate the malware from your personal computer and also create an invulnerable shield with a Proactive protection feature. However, let’s handle Shwfpd adware initially.

Removing Shwfpd 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 Shwfpd 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 need. Make a text file titled “hosts” on your pc’s desktop, after that 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 trouble that makes things much harder to restore, specifically without the anti-malware program. A lot of adware variants that are used to show you the Shwfpd pop-up promotions are adjusting the deep browser settings, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you attempt to fix your browser settings after your computer was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will certainly collapse quickly. In some cases, you will see no crash, however, huge lag spike after pressing the “settings” key. Browser will stop reacting for ~ 30 seconds, and then it will be back to the typical, until you try 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 Shwfpd Pop-ups?

Name: Shwfpd

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