Mac Viruses

LandSlide Search is a malicious piece that exists in both program and extension versions. It is presented as a tool to alleviate the searching process by altering your homepage and changing the search engine to search.landslidesearch.com. For example, if you try to type something in Google search engine it will instantly dispatch you over to its LandSlide Search engine. However, it operates as a hijacker that is supposed to track your browser's activity and show unwanted advertisements on its homepage apparently as a way to gain profit. Most fabricated search engines cannot actually generate search results, so they automatically redirect to Google, Yahoo, Bing or other legitimate search engines. Search.landslidesearch.com is not an exception, it redirects to Yahoo search engine which seems to be minor and absolutely clear. However, it still drops the browser working speed and can gather your data (such as IP-addresses, passwords, geolocations and other valuable info).

MindSpark ToolBar is one of the browser extensions that is installed directly to your computer and aimed to provide a more convenient browser interface including customizable homepage, fast access to multiple websites, your social pages, online stores and so forth. Besides that, it changes the search engine to "Ask" and outgoing results as well. It is available for the most popular browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer. Generally, there are so many analogs of it that seem to be executing the same positive purpose, although not for users themselves. And this is when the dark side begins. MindSpark ToolBar can also show lots of malicious ads, pop-ups and banners whilst surfing. It is capable of acquiring access to your personal data, passwords and many other morsels that third parties can largely chew on.

Adf.ly is a legitimate advertising service providing a URL-shortening feature. It is known for redirecting users to websites in order to display some paid advertisements before entering the actual page. However, by doing so, it can also provoke pop-ups appearing above the website and force you into pages that include lots of unwanted resources. Basically, push notifications offered by pop-ups can be pretty useful on such informative resources like blogs, online newspapers, and so on. Nonetheless, browser hackers managed to penetrate into Adf.ly and put tricky pop-ups to make you receive deceptive ads in the right bottom of your screen, that are often used to promote adware, browser hijackers, and potentially malicious applications. This may eventually fool you into clicking on these ads that may lead to intrusive advertisements, cause unwanted redirects, modify browser settings, and record sensitive data.

Qsearch.pw is unpleasant browser search redirect related to Searchmine browser hijacker. It manifests itself in Safari, Google Chrome, and Mozilla Firefox by modifying default search engine and homepage settings. Malware takes control over these settings, as well as new tab settings, with help of QSearch extension or application of the same name. In many cases, the problem can be solved by removing the unwanted app, however, it is, often, hidden from users and has many leftover items in system folders. That is why we recommend you to use special anti-malware tools for Mac offered below. Qsearch.pw is not a virus or worm, it acts more like adware, by providing undesired search results, filled with ads, sponsored links, etc.

Super Mac Cleaner is fake optimization utility for macOS, that uses the fraudulent scheme to force users to buy its license. Like many other similar applications, that promise to "clean up" your Mac, Super Mac Cleaner provides deceptive over-exaggerated results. It finds severe performance issues, hardware and software errors, duplicate files and other problems, that, possibly, never existed on your computer. If users ignore and just close this app, it starts the carousel of reminders, alerts, and warnings with the number of issues found and that it is necessary to fix them using Super Mac Cleaner. Besides, many users cannot remove this unwanted app using the standard procedure for macOS. In this article, we prepared simple instructions to remove Super Mac Cleaner and its leftovers and get rid of related alerts.

Mac Heal Pro is deceptive Mac optimisation application. After installation, it opens on the whole screen and starts a fake system scan. It does not give users the opportunity to resize the window. When the scan is finished, Mac Heal Pro offers paid activation, which costs $60 - $70. The problem is, that viruses, errors and performance issues, found by this app, never existed on your Mac. Mac Heal Pro is categorized as rogue program, fake optimization software. The virus poses a threat to the financial security and privacy of the users, due to its misleading tactics, untrustworthy scan results, and unscrupulous developers. There are also some complaints, that Mac Heal Pro cannot be removed, or keeps coming back.

Similar Photo Cleaner is ad-supported application for Mac. It was developed to detect and remove duplicate photos and pictures. It is one of those pointless apps, that provide low functionality, but leads to severe computer and privacy problems. It installs without user's consent, and does not disclose all conditions of the installation. The consequences of installing the program are pitiable: users start seeing ads and pop-ups in browsers, they get unknown programs installed without their intention. Besides, some users complain, that they cannot quit Similar Photo Cleaner, as it displays pop-up, that cannot be closed (see the picture below). All this peculiar properties put the program to the category of potentially unwanted apps.

Smart Mac Booster is fake anti-virus and optimization software for Mac. It can be called an imposed application, as it is offered for download to users after an "in-browser" virus or error scan, that finds "severe issues". Of course, a real system scan cannot be performed in any browser, this is just a pretext to get Smart Mac Booster installed on a Mac. After infiltrating the system, the unwanted application initiates a quick scan and finds a huge amount of problems, that have to be fixed. In the end, the results are announced by the female computer voice. When victims try to resolve the problems, the software offers to buy the license. But what really puts the program in a category of badware is, that if users try to uninstall it from Applications, it'll either won't allow them to do it by showing alerts and warnings or will leave residual persistent module, that will cause errors in macOS.