PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker - How to remove

PDF-Searchz.com is a website that takes over web browsers and redirects their search queries to Yahoo. It may also show pop-up ads on your screen by using web notifications.

PDF-Searchz.com spreads with the PDFSearchz extension. It’s promoted on download sites, video streaming sites, and torrenting websites. People don’t install it intentionally, as it doesn’t have any useful features; all it does is collect people’s browsing data and force them to go to Yahoo.com.

About PDF-Searchz.com:

Classification	Browser hijacker, adware.
How to remove PDF-Searchz.com	Uninstall PDFSearchz and other unwanted extensions, remove malware from your computer (Combo Cleaner for Mac, Spyhunter for PC, others), block notifications from unwanted sites.
Problems with PDF-Searchz.com	It’s bad for privacy, it restricts browser settings, forcing Yahoo as the default search engine.
How PDFSearchz spreads	Advertised with unexpected redirects and fake download buttons, embedded in the installers of other programs.

How to remove PDF-Searchz.com

If PDF-Searchz.com took over your browser, you need to remove it to get back control over your internet search settings and your privacy.

PDFSearchz is the browser extension responsible for stealing people’s traffic and sending it to PDF-Searchz.com (pretty much the same name, but one is a browser extension that you need to remove, and the other is a website). Check if PDFSearchz is installed, remove it, and fix browser settings for the default search engine.

You can use an anti-malware program, such as Combo Cleaner for macOS, Spyhunter for Windows, and others. Use them to scan your computer and delete malicious programs if any are found.

You can also find and remove malicious programs manually, with browser hijackers being the easiest to remove. Open the Settings/Preferences page of your browser, click Extensions, find PDFSearchz, and remove it. More detailed instructions can be found at the bottom.

If a problem comes up with removing extensions, check out our post on enterprise policy-abusing add-ons.

If a site like PDF-Searchz.com or Notify-service.com is spamming your browser with ads, block their notifications:

• Chrome – type “chrome://settings/content/notifications” in the address box.
• Safari – in the Safari menu, choose Preferences, Websites, Notifications.
• Edge (Chromium) – type “edge://settings/content/notifications” in the address box.
• Firefox – open Settings, Privacy & Security, scroll down to Permissions, and click on Settings next to Notifications.

Find the unwanted sites, click the button next to each address, and select Block. This stops them from sending any more notifications to you.

Problems with PDF-Searchz.com

PDF-Searchz.com is a worthless site that only exists to make money while providing no valuable features or content. Here are some of the problems with it:

• It spreads deceptively. It may appear in your browser without you having added it intentionally.
• It’s bad for privacy. It collects data including your search queries, browsing history, hardware, installed programs, and other data.
• It gets access to notifications. Notifications are used by malicious websites to deliver ads straight to browsers.
• It changes the default search engine. It goes to Yahoo.

You might have noticed that Yahoo started delivering your search results. Maybe you first suspected that something was wrong when your new tab page changed how it looks. But you may have not noticed anything wrong. The PDFSearchz extension is nearly invisible once it’s installed.

In other words, PDF-Searchz.com doesn’t have any features to make it worth using. It’s purely a browser hijacker, an adware infection. It exists to waste people’s time and to make them visit sites that display ads. PDF-Searchz.com makes money from this.

PDF-Searchz.com is only one of many hijackers that do this. Anygamesearch.com and Allradiosearch.com are a couple of related add-ons. Sometimes, a few of them can be installed on the same browser at once.

How hijackers spread

PDF-Searchz.com’s description is pretty honest about what the extension does: changes the default search to Yahoo. Though, as people don’t install PDFSearchz normally, they don’t get to see that description.

As PDFSearchz has no useful features, it does not advertise on its merits. Instead, it is promoted by deceptive ads that trick people into installing it accidentally.

• PDFSearchz can come bundled with the installers of free programs. Be very careful when downloading installers from shady websites.
• Fake installation and download pages are also used to promote PDF-Searchz.com. These pages are ads, but they look like serious warnings. They are meant to confuse visitors and to trick them into clicking on a fake download button.

However it happened, PDF-Searchz.com is not honest in how it is installed. By now, its page on the Chrome Web Store says that it has more than 80,000 users.

Automatic Malware removal tools

Check browser settings

TopHow To remove PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker from Google Chrome:

• Click on the 3 horizontal lines icon on a browser toolbar and Select More Tools→Extensions
  
• Select all malicious extensions and delete them.
  
• Click on the 3 horizontal lines icon on a browser toolbar and Select Settings
  
• Select Manage Search engines
  
• Remove unnecessary search engines from the list
  
• Go back to settings. On Startup choose Open blank page (you can remove undesired pages from the set pages link too).
• If your homepage was changed, click on Chrome menu on the top right corner, select Settings. Select Open a specific page or set of pages and click on Set pages.
  
• Delete malicious search websites at a new Startup pages window by clicking “X” next to them.
  

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings

If you are still experiencing any issues related to PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings.

• Click on a Chrome’s menu button (three horizontal lines) and select Settings.
• Scroll to the end of the page and click on theReset browser settings button.
  
• Click on the Reset button on the confirmation box.
  

If you cannot reset your browser settings and the problem persists, scan your system with an anti-malware program.

How to remove PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker from Microsoft Edge:Top

• Click on the menu button on the top right corner of a Microsoft Edge window. Select “Extensions”.

• Select all malicious extensions and delete them.

• Click on the three-dot menu on the browser toolbar and Select Settings

• Select Privacy and Services and scroll down. Press on Address bar.

• Choose Manage search engines.

• Remove unnecessary search engines from the list: open the three-dot menu and choose Remove.

• Go back to Settings. Open On start-up.
• Delete malicious search websites at Open specific page or pages by opening the three-dot menu and clicking Delete.

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings If you are still experiencing any issues related to PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings

• Click on Edge's menu button and select Settings. Click on the Reset Settings button on the left.
• Press the Restore settings to their default values option.

• Click on the Reset button on the confirmation box.

If you cannot reset your browser settings and the problem persists, scan your system with an anti-malware program.

How To remove PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker from Firefox:Top

• Click on the menu button on the top right corner of a Mozilla window and select the “Add-ons” icon (Or press Ctrl+Shift+A on your keyboard).
  
• Go through Extensions and Addons list, remove everything PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker related and items you do not recognise. If you do not know the extension and it is not made by Mozilla, Google, Microsoft, Oracle or Adobe then you probably do not need it.
  
• If your homepage was changed, click on the Firefox menu in the top right corner, select Options → General. Enter a preferable URL to the homepage field and click Restore to Default.
  

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings If you are still experiencing any issues related to PDF-Searchz.com Hijacker, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings.

• Click on the menu button on the top right corner of a Mozilla Firefox window. Click on the Help button.
  
• ChooseTroubleshooting Information on the Help menu.
  
• Click on theReset Firefox button.
  
• Click on the Reset Firefox button on the confirmation box. Mozilla Firefox will close and change the settings to default.
  

If the problem persists, scan your system with an anti-malware program to identify malicious entries.