Protectium - How to remove

Protectium is a free application that strongly reminds of previously released BoBrowser. It claims to enhance your browsing experience by protecting you from visiting infected websites and increasing the speed of your downloads. It works with multiple browsers, including Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome. Unfortunately, users cannot trust Protectium, as it’s known to have some annoying features which not only makes it very difficult to browse because of constantly displayed ads, but also it can interfere with your privacy.

It is recommended to remove Protectium from your computer if you want to stay safe and you don’t want to be supporting adware creators and make profit for them. Run a full system scan with a reliable anti-malware tool, such as Spyhunter or StopZilla and eliminate this adware once you notice its activity. If you prefer removing the program manually, you can use a tutorial provided below.

About Protectium

Once installed, Protectium displays various advertisements on your Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome. You will see anything from regular popup ads to in-text offers and banners. Most if the ads are labeled as brought by Protectium. There is one thing in common among these ads – they all contain links to third party websites. Once you click on Protectium Ads, you will be immediately redirected.

Clearly there are no guarantees these websites are safe to visit. You can easily infect your system with spyware and other dangerous threats. Since Protectium Ads redirect to third party pages, you also make pay-per-click profit for the adware creators. This kind of promotions are not fair and they bring a lot of inconveniences for the users. They cannot browse without interruptions by Protectium Ads and overall a computer performance may slow down. Stay clear of such applications and if they have been added to your system unintentionally, remove them immediately.

Distribution Methods of Protectium

Protectium has it’s official website (Protectium.com) and its download is available there. However, the most common way to be installed is along other freeware. Protectium comes bundled to free media players, download managers, etc, as an optional download. You should be more careful when installing such applications to your system. Always choose a Custom installation mode and follow the installation steps carefully to avoid adding such programs like Protectium. Never click ‘Next’ or ‘Agree’ buttons without reading what you are accepting and deselect all options that indicate about unknown additional programs.

To remove Protectium, follow the guide provided below or use an anti-malware program and run a full system scan with it.

Manual removal of Protectium

How to remove Protectium using Windows Control Panel

Many hijackers and adware like Protectium install some of their components as regular Windows programs as well as additional software. This part of malware can be uninstalled from the Control Panel. To access it, do the following.

• Start→Control Panel (older Windows) or press Windows Key→Search and enter Control Panel and then press Enter (Windows 8, Windows 10).
• Choose Uninstall Program (if you don't see it, click in the upper right next to "View by" and select Category).
• Go through the list of programs and select entries related to Protectium . You can click on "Name" or "Installed On" to reorder your programs and make Protectium easier to find.
• Click the Uninstall button. If you're asked if you really want to remove the program, click Yes.
• In many cases anti-malware programs are better at detecting related parasites, thus I recommend installing Spyhunter to identify other programs that might be a part of this infection.

How to remove Protectium from macOS

Delete Protectium from your applications.

1. Open Finder.
2. In the menu bar, click Go.
3. Select Applications from the dropdown.
4. Find the Protectium app.
5. Select it and right-click it (or hold the Ctrl and click the left mouse button).
6. In the dropdown, click Move to Bin/Trash. You might be asked to provide your login password.

TopRemove malicious extensions from Internet Explorer

• Press on the Gear icon→Manage Add-ons.
  
• Go through Toolbars and extensions. Remove everything related to Protectium and items you do not know that are made not by Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Oracle or Adobe.
  
• Close the Options.

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings

If you are still experiencing any issues related to Protectium, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings.

• Press on the Gear icon->Internet Options.
  
• Choose the Advanced tab and click on the Reset button.
  
• Select a “Delete personal settings” checkbox and click on the Reset button.
  
• Click on the Close button on the confirmation box, then close your browser.
  

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

TopRemoving Protectium from Chrome

• Click on the menu button on the top right corner of a Google Chrome window. Select “Settings”.
  
• Click “Extensions” on the left menu bar.
• Go through the extensions list and remove programs you do not need, especially similar to Protectium. Click on the trash bin icon next to Protectium or other add-ons you want to remove.
  
• Press on the “Remove” button on the Confirmation window.
  
• If unsure, you can disable them temporarily.
  
• Restart Chrome.

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings

If you are still experiencing any issues related to Protectium, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings.

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

TopRemoving Protectium from Firefox

• 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 Protectium 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.
  

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings If you are still experiencing any issues related to Protectium, 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.
  
• Choose Troubleshooting Information on the Help menu.
  
• Click on the Reset Firefox button.
  
• Click on the Reset Firefox button on the confirmation box. Mozilla Firefox will close and change the settings to default.
  

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

How to remove Protectium from Microsoft Edge:Top

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

• Go through the extensions list and remove programs you do not need, especially similar to Protectium. Click on the "Remove" icon next to Protectium or other add-ons you want to remove.

• Press on the “Remove” button on the Confirmation window.

• If unsure, you can disable them temporarily.

• Restart Microsoft Edge.

TopRemoving Protectium from Safari (Mac OS X)

• Click on the Safari menu.
• Choose Preferences.
  
• Click on the Extensions Tab.
• Click on the Uninstall button near the Protectium. Remove all other unknown or suspicious entries too. If you are not sure whether you need the extension or not, you can simply uncheck the Enable check-box to disable the extension temporarily.
  
• Restart Safari.

(Optional) Reset your browser’s settings

If you are still experiencing any issues related to Protectium, reset the settings of your browser to its default settings.

• Click on the Safari menu on the top left corner of the screen. Select Reset Safari.
  
• Select which options you want to reset (usually all of them come preselected) and click on the Reset button.
  

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