Smarty Extension - How to remove

Smarty is a browser extension that offers to help users save money when shopping online. It compares product prices among a few online stores and offers coupons and cashback.

I can’t comment on whether Smarty does help users save. My problem with Smarty is the kinds of ads that it uses to promote itself. Some of the ads for the Smarty extension are misleading and could cause people to install the extension without meaning to.

About the Smarty extension:

Classification	Potentially unwanted program.
How does Smarty work?	It’s a coupon extension that’s supposed to help users save while shopping.
Problems and issues	Smarty is advertised in the same way as some browser hijackers.
Should you remove Smarty?	Consider if you installed it intentionally, check if you have any unwanted subscriptions, scan your computer for malware (Spyhunter for PC, Spyhunter for Mac, Combo Cleaner for Mac, others).

What is Smarty?

Smarty is a browser add-on. It’s associated with a website – Joinsmarty.com – that works as an online store. It’s also connected to Getsmartyapp.com.

According to the web analytics site Similarweb, Joinsmarty.com’s monthly visits have grown from around 4 million to more than 9 million in the last couple of months. Smartyplus.net, the site for the paid tier of Smarty, is not as popular, but it’s still present.

Currently, the Smarty browser extension has Chrome (more than 100,000 users), Edge (more than 20,000 users), and Firefox (more than 4,000 users) versions.

Despite Smarty’s popularity, there’s not much information on the extension. There are a good number of reviews on Trustpilot (it seems like users of Smarty are encouraged to leave reviews when they start using the extension), but that’s about it.

I haven’t tested if the extension helps users save money. It seems like it does, based on some reviews. Other users imply that there are technical issues with some of the cashbacks and coupons, but these problems are probably not intentional.

I was curious how Smarty makes money. According to the Smartyplus.net website, it gets a bit of money whenever a user buys an item from a link to a third-party vendor that was shared by Smarty. Nothing suspicious here, as long as you’re aware of this.

Problems with ads for Smarty

I first came across Smarty after I clicked on a link shared on a fake forum site. The screenshots are below:

Fake forum pages share fake download links. While the ad for Smarty is pretty obvious, it could be understood by a user that they have to install Smarty if they want to download the file that they were searching for.

What are fake forum sites?

There are a bunch of fake forum sites online that spread malicious links. The threads always go like this:

[Q] Hey, anyone know where I can find this item – [item name]?

[A] Sure, here’s the direct download link: [link].

The [item name] text is generated depending on what the user searched for. It might be a book, a movie, a document template, or any other file.

The malicious site always shows the same fake forum thread, only with [item name] changed.

There are fake Yahoo Answers sites, the examples mentioned in the post on Download-pdfs.com, and the Qanswers.site sites. Fake forum sites are used by the Gootloader technique.

How do people find them?

Fake forum sites are found in web search results. I was using Google.

Fake forum threads share links to scam sites and other iffy sites. I often see them promoting subscription scams such as Readz411.com – sites that promise free access to whatever file the user was searching for, then signs them up for a monthly subscription of around $50.

They’re fake ads, as they promise something that they never deliver. The fact that Smarty was advertised alongside such deceptive sites and by using the same misleading technique was what made me suspicious of this extension.

It might not be Smarty’s intention to mislead users. Based on the redirects to Getsmartyapp.com and the Chrome Web Store, Adcash is involved in advertising the extension; Adcash doesn’t have the best reputation as it’s known to show pop-up ads and malicious ads from time to time.

Should you remove Smarty?

As far as I can tell, Smarty is a safe browser add-on. But you should only use it if you want to.

Based on some of Smarty’s negative reviews on Trustpilot, there are some people who signed up for the app’s the paid tier without meaning to. If that happened to you, cancel the subscription on Smartyplus.net.

Fake forum sites promote various subscription scams. If, after clicking a link on a similar forum page, you signed up for an account with your personal and payment info, you might want to cancel that subscription.

If you downloaded any files from such a forum site, it would be wise to check your device for malware (you can use anti-malware apps like Spyhunter for PC, Spyhunter for Mac, Combo Cleaner for Mac, etc.).

Automatic Malware removal tools

How to remove browser extensions

TopRemoving Smarty Extension 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 Smarty. Click on the trash bin icon next to Smarty Extension 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 Smarty, 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 Smarty Extension 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 Smarty Extension. Click on the "Remove" icon next to Smarty 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 Smarty Extension 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 Smarty 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 Smarty Extension, 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.