How to remove Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-ups? — Fix Guide

Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-up notifications can appear unexpectedly, overlaying the content of the website you are browsing or opening your web browser without your consent.

Clicking on the Sitedirector.symantec.com promotion can result in the installation of various malware or unwanted programs. In this post, you will find a tutorial on how to remove Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-ups using multiple methods, as well as how to check your personal computer for the presence of other viruses.

It is better to prevent, than repair and repent!

Removing Sitedirector.symantec.com manually may take hours and may damage your PC in the process. I recommend you to download GridinSoft Anti-Malware for threats removal. Allows to complete scan and cure your PC during the trial period.

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What are Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-ups?

Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-ups are caused by adware. Adware is a type of malware that displays pay-per-view or pay-per-click advertisements, generating a significant amount of revenue for the adware providers. These advertisements may sometimes contain shocking information or link to malicious content/websites because adware maintainers do not have any intention to verify the legitimacy of the content they display – their sole objective is to make money.

Sitedirector.symantec.com push notification.

Pop-up promotions itself is a good, affordable and extremely productive marketing method¹. It allows the seller to attach the buyers’ attention to their website, and the buyers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they want to buy. When the consumer will get a pop-up notification that the TV set he wishes to purchase is offered at the online store he/she saw earlier with a 15% discount, one will undoubtedly use this chance and get it. Taking into consideration the very small cost for the popups and their targeting, such an advertising tool is a favorite thing among the advertising departments of huge internet sellers.

However, such a rewarding strategy could not be missed by virus developers. Option to show the popup advertisements by force to the targets of malware attack is a great basis for evil-minded manipulations with the popup advertisements. And Sitedirector.symantec.com ads is just one of hundreds that are “employed” in this system.

Here is a short info for the Sitedirector.symantec.com site

How have I got the Sitedirector.symantec.com virus?

There are a lot of ways of becoming infected by the adware that lead to the Sitedirector.symantec.com popups tornado. A lion’s part of this computer virus cases is after the freeware or cracked programs, that are spread on the peering networks. Free software may likewise be downloaded from the official web page, and the adware is offered as a legit bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A plenty of users regularly use the unreliable programs from untrusted providers: abandonware, a wide range of apps that are free, and even hacked programs. Every one of these types of programs are dangerous, due to the fact that it is extremely easy to integrate a Sitedirector.symantec.com malware under the guise of part of the license hacking script, or as a part of the self-made algoritm inside of the Windows optimization tool.

Sitedirector.symantec.com popup malware may likewise be concealed in the advertisement somewhere on the unusual site. Such websites are typically loaded with intense and blinking ads, and their owners generally permit any kind of promos to be published on their web page. Thus, clicking on such banners is a risky thing: only the ad provider knows what will happen when you click this ad. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or undesirable programs, you may likewise get something much more dangerous, like ransomware or coin miner; the substantial share of coin miners distribution is exactly after the malicious ads.

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

Potentially unwanted programs, like Sitedirector.symantec.com popup virus can provoke a lot of problems on your PC. Distracting is not the only effect – pop-up notifications may display you the banners, where you are offered to download one more strange program, or “a effective security tool”. Scareware is often spread under the last motto. Potentially undesirable applications, in turn, can have spyware functionality. And it is very hard to distinguish the unwanted app from a legit one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the PUPs and fake antiviruses, popup-related ads are also chosen as a distribution way by different trojan viruses, for instance – coin miners. The consequences of activity of such malware is 100% unpleasant, and can cost you hundreds or even thousands of dollars. And even if you are not clicking these promotions, they can be clicked by whoever who also uses your computer – parents, children, spouse, etc. So the situation can become much more serious, and it will be much harder to solve it without information loss. It is recommended to eliminate the viruses with anti-malware applications as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-up advertisements?

The tutorial of Sitedirector.symantec.com adware clearing consists of 2 sections. Initially, we need to exterminate the malware, and then repair the effects of its activity. The elimination procedure is pretty easy, since it can be done even with using Microsoft Defender – anti-malware tool that is available on all computers with Windows 8/10. Nevertheless, because of its substantial resources consumption, along with some errors that may be serious for some groups of users, Defender is often turned off by the users, so its utilization is likely impossible. Furthermore, a variety of trojan viruses are able to turn off the embedded antivirus. It is far better to make use of the separated program that will not have such weakness.

I would certainly suggest you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware² – a well-proven security device that will surely remove the malware from your system and make an impenetrable cover with a Proactive protection function. But let’s take care of Sitedirector.symantec.com adware initially.

Removing Sitedirector.symantec.com 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.

• 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.

• When the scan is over, you may choose the action for each detected virus. For all files of Sitedirector.symantec.com malware the default option is “Delete”. Press “Apply” to finish the malware removal.

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. 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. In the next screen, find the “Refresh Firefox” option :

After choosing this option, you will see the next message :

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 ensure that your browser will connect the correct DNS while connecting to the site you need. Make a text file named “hosts” on your computer’s desktop, then open it and fill it with the following text³:

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 trouble that makes the things much harder to restore, particularly without the anti-malware program. The majority of adware variations that are utilized to show you the Sitedirector.symantec.com pop-up advertisements are changing the deep browser setups, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you try to fix your browser settings after your computer was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will collapse soon. In certain cases, you will see no crash, but huge lag spike after pushing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 secs, and after that it will be back to the normal, till 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.

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.

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.

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