Shield My Searches - How to remove

In theory, Shield My Searches is supposed to help users stay secure while browsing the web. It’s supposed to create a private search experience and stop search engines from tracking you. Its main promise is to not record your search queries. But what good is that when Shield My Searches exposes you to so many ads?

In short about Shield My Searches:

Type of threat	Potentially unwanted program, browser hijacker, adware.
How Shield My Searches gets installed	Promoted by other browser hijackers and by adware, advertised on alternative search engines.
Problems and issues	Hijacks browser search settings, displays a lot of ads, is associated with other low-quality browser extensions.
How to remove Shield My Searches	Stop unwanted notifications in your browser settings, scan for adware (with Combo Cleaner for Mac, Spyhunter for PC, etc.) and remove it if any is found, remove unwanted extensions manually.

Effects of Shield My Searches

Ad-Supported Search Engine

Shield My Searches is a browser extension – a small application that is attached to your web browser and changes how your browser works. It does this by changing some browser settings and forcing its website, Search.shieldmysearches.com, to be your new search engine.

A search engine is a website that returns your internet search results, the most popular one being Google. Most search engines are monetized by showing ads alongside genuine search results.

Shield My Searches can be installed on Shieldmysearches.com, which also asks you to allow it to send you notifications. The notifications appear as little pop-up boxes in your web browser and are used for advertising, as it’s explained in Shield My Searches’ privacy policy. The Shieldmysearches.com search results also have a lot of ads, which is understandable – for a commercial site to be free, it needs ads. But it’s not great for privacy, as third-party sites and ads have their own tracking tools, so Shield My Searches’ promise of not tracking you is not worth much.

Just Another Browser Extension

When Shield My Searches is installed, you can check its permissions in extension settings:

• it reads your browsing history,
• changes your search settings to Shieldmysearches.com,
• and gets access to Google.com.

That last one is kind of concerning, as lets Shield My Searches add and remove content from the Google.com pages in your browser. Browser extensions getting access to Google.com specifically is usually a bad sign. At best, it can be used to scan the links and warn you about dangerous ones; at worst, it can be used to inject malicious links into your search results. And there are a lot of malicious browser extensions out there.

Hopefully, Shield My Searches is not that. This permission is just there to redirect users away from Google when they try to use it. Supposedly, to protect them. In reality, to get more people to use Shield My Searches.

The thing is, Shield My Searches is not really all that good for privacy:

• it still exposes you to third-party ads,
• and there are way too many ads on Search.shieldmysearches.com,
• Shield My Searches is made by Innover Group, the company behind Search Anything, Safeplex Search, and Daily Top Coupons.

At the end of the day, Shield My Searches is as much based on advertising as other search engines. At least, with Google, you can easily delete most of the data that it has collected on you. Shield My Searches promises to not collect your data to help you avoid intrusive advertisements, but with this extension, you are bombarded with more ads than before.

How to Remove Shield My Searches

Nothing bad will happen if you keep using Shield My Searches, but it’s advisable to just not use it. It and other “privacy” extensions often are actually adware. It can be hard to find a trustworthy and free privacy-protecting extension. And if Shield My Searches is anything like Innover’s other extensions, it will lead to more browser add-ons with more and more ads. The fewer extensions you have in your browser, the better it is for your privacy.

If you want to remove Shield My Searches, I put the instructions below. For stopping unwanted notification pop-ups, you can check this post on web push notifications.

If you have issues with pop-up ads or browser hijackings, you may want to scan your computer with an anti-malware program, such as Combo Cleaner for macOS, Spyhunter for Windows, or whatever program you trust. If there’s any adware or potentially unwanted programs on your device, they should show up in the scan results. Then you’ll know you need to get rid of them. When people say that they get too many ads, half the time their issue is caused not by the websites that they visit, but by a sneaky adware infection.

Automatic Malware removal tools

Manually Removing Browser Extensions

TopRemoving Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches. Click on the trash bin icon next to Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches, 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.

How to remove Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches. Click on the "Remove" icon next to Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches 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 Shield My Searches, 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.