Youtube Accelerator is a potentially unwanted program that is promoted as a tool for Windows, to accelerate the speed of videos and improve Youtube videos performance. It mainly affects Internet Explorer, but in some cases, it may affect Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome as well. Youtube Accelerator displays a popup on infected computers asking if you would like to increase the speed of Youtube videos. However, it is displayed when the program is already installed so, for this reason, it is categorized as potentially unwanted program (PUP).
Once inside, Youtube Accelerator changes your homepage to home.speedbit.com. This website is known for causing redirects to commercial websites, including compromised ones and hijacking your search results. The program doesn’t disclose about making any changes in your browser and this is one more reason to classify this application as an unwanted one. Additionally, Youtube Accelerator may install other unwanted software to your computer, which may cause various security related issues.
If you wonder how this program has managed to enter your computer, it is quite easy to explain. Youtube Accelerator usually comes bundled with freeware and shareware applications. To avoid its download, you have to pay attention to the installation steps of any new programs that you are downloading, even if it is a well-known software. Follow every step and if you see any optional downloads, offers to change your homepage/search provider or make other modifications, make sure you take off the check marks next to them, unless you know these changes are going to be beneficial.
To remove Youtube Accelerator, go to Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs list and uninstall anything Youtube Accelerator related from there. Some versions of this hijacker install software that blocks browser settings from changing. To identify them, scanning with Spyhunter or other reputable antispyware tool might be useful. Then you can uninstall the extensions and reset settings in your browsers.
How to remove Youtube Accelerator from Internet Explorer (older versions):
- Click on the arrow on the right of the search box;
- Do the following: on IE8-9 choose Manage Search providers, on IE7 click Change search defaults;
- Remove home.speedbit.com and anything Youtube Accelerator related from the list.
How To remove Youtube Accelerator from IE 11:
- Click on the Settings icon (top right)->Manage Addons;
- Select Search Providers;
- Change the default search engine to Bing or Google;
- If any of these search providers is not available, follow “Find more search providers” in the bottom of the screen and install Google.
How To remove Youtube Accelerator from Firefox:
- Enter “about:config” in url bar. This will open settings page;
- Type “Keyword.url” in the search box. Right click and reset it;
- Type “browser.search.defaultengine” in the search box. Right click it and reset it;
- Type “browser.search.selectedengine” in the search box. Right click it and reset it;
- Type “browser.startup.homepage” in the search box. Right click it and reset;
- Search for “browser.newtab.url”. Right-click and reset. This will make sure that the search page won’t launch on every new tab;
- If the settings revert and scan with anti-malware programs are clean: close Firefox, open file explorer and enter %AppData% in the address bar. Enter user.js in the search box. If this file exists, rename it and start Firefox again. You will have to repeat the steps above.
How To remove Youtube Accelerator from Google Chrome:
- Click on the 3 horizontal lines icon on the browser toolbar.
- Select Settings.
- Select Basics ->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 New Tab page is hijacked, you will have to scan with anti-malware program or use New Tab Redirect extension from Chrome Store
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