Remove Xcfss2.xyz Pop-up Virus — How to Remove?

Written by Wilbur Woodham
Xcfss2.xyz pop-up notifications may appear unexpectedly, covering the content of the page you went to or opening your browser when you do not wish it to be opened.

Clicking on the Xcfss2.xyz ad may result in the injection of other malware or unwanted programs. In this post, you will see the tutorial of Xcfss2.xyz popups clearing in various ways, as well as checking your personal computer for extra malware existence.

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What are Xcfss2.xyz pop-ups?

Xcfss2.xyz popups are a result of adware activity. Adware is a sort of malware that presents you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click advertisements, which produces a large volume of income for adware representatives. These promotions might have explicit content, or have a link to harmful content/website, since adware maintainers have no reason to examine the goodness of the web content they are going to show – their solitary target is cash.

Xcfss2.xyz push notification

Xcfss2.xyz push notification.

Pop-up marketing itself is a very good, affordable and extremely efficient marketing solution1. It allows the vendor to attach the customers’ interest to their site, as well as the customers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they want to buy. When the customer will get a pop-up alert that the TV set he desires to purchase is provided at the online shop he/she saw earlier with a 15% price cut, one will definitely use this chance and buy it. Considering the incredibly low price for the popups and their targeting, such a marketing instrument is a favourite thing amongst the advertising teams of big internet retail stores.

However, such a profitable plan could not be missed by malware creators. Potential to show the popup advertisements forcibly to the people of malware attack is a perfect basis for malicious tricks with the popup promotions. And Xcfss2.xyz promotions is one of hundreds that are “employed” in this scheme.

Here is a info for the Xcfss2.xyz site
Site Xcfss2.xyz
Hosting AS13335 Cloudflare, Inc.
United States, San Francisco
Infection Type Adware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address 188.114.96.3
Symptoms Annoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behavior Adshome, Notifsystems, Jigisup
Fix Tool
To remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the Xcfss2.xyz virus?

There are a plenty of ways of getting contaminated by the adware that create the Xcfss2.xyz 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 may also be downloaded from the official web page, and the adware is provided as a legitimate bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A huge amount of users oftentimes make use of the unreliable programs from untrusted providers: abandonware, a wide range of apps that are free, or even hacked programs. Every one of these types of programs are unsafe, since it is extremely simple to build in a Xcfss2.xyz malware under the cover of part of the license hacking script, or as a part of the self-made algoritm within the Windows optimization tool.

Xcfss2.xyz popup malware may also be hidden in the ad somewhere on the unusual web page. Such web pages are generally filled with colorful and blinking ads, and their owners often accept any type of promos to be published on their web page. Thus, clicking such banners is a shot in the dark: only the ad provider realizes what will occur when you press this advertisement. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or unwanted programs, you may additionally receive something much more unsafe, like ransomware or coin miner; the substantial share of coin miners distribution is exactly after the malicious advertisements.

People dislike popups

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

Potentially unwanted programs, like Xcfss2.xyz pop-up virus may cause a variety of different problems on your computer. Distracting is not the single effect – pop-up notifications can present you the advertisements, where you are offered to download another strange application, or “a effective security tool”. Scareware is often distributed with the last slogun. Potentially unwanted programs, in turn, may have spyware functionality. And it is quite hard to distinguish the unwanted app from a good one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the potentially unwanted programs and fake antiviruses, popup-related banners are also exploited as a spreading way by various trojan viruses, for example – coin miners. The consequences of activity of such viruses is 100% unwanted, and can cost you hundreds of dollars. And even if you are not tapping these ads, they can be clicked by someone who also uses 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 get rid of the viruses with anti-malware applications as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of Xcfss2.xyz pop-up advertisements?

The tutorial of Xcfss2.xyz adware clearing includes 2 parts. First, we need to eliminate the malware, and after that take care of the results of its action. The elimination process is pretty easy, due to the fact that it may be performed even with the use of Microsoft Defender – security tool that is available on all computers with Windows 8/10. However, because of its significant resources consumption, as well as some failures that may be critical for some categories of individuals, Defender is oftentimes disabled by the users, so its usage is likely impossible. Furthermore, a variety of trojan viruses are able to turn off the embedded antivirus. It is 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 anti-malware device that will undoubtedly remove the malware from your personal computer and also create an impenetrable shield with a Proactive protection feature. But let’s take care of Xcfss2.xyz adware first.

Removing Xcfss2.xyz 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 Xcfss2.xyz 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 web page you need. Create a text file titled “hosts” on your desktop, after that 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 trouble that makes things much harder to repair, specifically without the anti-malware software. A lot of adware variants that are utilized to show you the Xcfss2.xyz pop-up promotions are adjusting the deep browser configurations, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you attempt to fix your browser settings after your computer was infected by pop-up-related malware, your browser will collapse soon. In some cases, you will see no crash, but large lag spike after pressing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 seconds, and then it will be back to the typical, up until you attempt 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 Xcfss2.xyz Pop-ups?

Name: Xcfss2.xyz

Description: Xcfss2.xyz - 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 Xcfss2.xyz push notifications?” or “why do Xcfss2.xyz pop-ups keep appearing on Chrome even after AdBlock installation?”. In this article we will show you how to deal with Xcfss2.xyz 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 suggest it for malware elimination.
  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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