How to remove www-searching.com

What is www-searching.com

Www-searching.com is dangerous browser hijacker that can replace user-defined settings of Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari. Usually, www-searching.com replaces homepage and sets up as default search engine. Main issues are: user cannot change settings back to desired, browser shortcuts are modified to open www-searching.com every time you start your browser. Hijacker www-searching.com redirects searches of the user to other untrusted search engine thesmartsearch.net. Search results may be filled with sponsored advertising, malicious links. Using this search may lead to unpredictable results. We prepared handy guide and explain how to remove www-searching.com from different versions of Windows and browsers.

How www-searching.com infected your PC

If you are interested how www-searching.com got in your browsers here is the answer. Main sources of infection with such types of threats (browser hijackers) are free apps bundled with potentially unwanted programs. Literally any free or shareware utility may contain adware inside. Installation is hidden, however, they offer you whether you want to install hijacker via separate or in-built window or check-boxes. To avoid installing www-searching.com users need to read all terms and conditions, and decline any unwanted offers. But you can use special programs, anti-malware or anti-spyware, that are different from anti-viruses. For example, SpyHunter 5 or Malwarebytes AntiMalware can remove www-searching.com or prevent its infiltration.

Download Removal Tool

Download Removal Tool

To remove www-searching.com completely we recommend you to use SpyHunter 5. It detects and removes all files, folders and registry keys of www-searching.com and several millions of other adware, hijackers, toolbars.

Remove www-searching.com manually for free

Here is manual step-by-step tutorial for full www-searching.com removal from your computer. This works 99% and was checked with the latest versions of www-searching.com installer on operating systems with latest updates and browser versions.

Remove www-searching.com from Control Panel

To start removing www-searching.com you should uninstall it using Control Panel. It can be present by different names – “Hao123-Client” or just “www-searching.com”. It should uninstall correctly, however, we recommend you to use IObit Uninstaller to clean leftover items after uninstalling. Here are instructions for Windows XP, Windows 7 and Windows 8.

Latest versions of www-searching.com hijacker are protected by program called www-searching.com. You can use SpyHunter 5 antimalware to remove it completely.

Remove www-searching.com from Windows XP:

1. Click on Start button.
2. Choose Control Panel.
3. Click Add or Remove Programs.
4. Find www-searching.com or Hao123-Client.
5. Click Uninstall.

Remove www-searching.com from Windows 7:

1. Click Start button.
2. Then go to Control Panel.
3. Click Uninstall a Program.
4. Find www-searching.com or Hao123-Client and click Uninstall.

Remove www-searching.com from Windows 8:

1. Hover mouse pointer to the bottom-right corner to see Menu.
2. Click Search.
3. After that click Apps.
4. Then Control Panel.
5. Click Uninstall a Program under Programs.
6. Find www-searching.com or Hao123-Client, click Uninstall.

Remove www-searching.com from Windows 10:

There are 2 ways to uninstall www-searching.com from Windows 10

Way one

1. Click on the Start button.
2. In opened menu choose Settings.
3. Click on the System tile.
4. Click Apps & features and locate www-searching.com or Hao123-Client in the list.
5. Click on it and then click Uninstall button near it.

Way two (classic)

1. Right-click on the Start button.
2. In opened menu choose Programs and Features.
3. Locate www-searching.com or Hao123-Client in the list.
4. Click on it and then click Uninstall button above.

Cannot uninstall www-searching.com

In some cases www-searching.com won’t uninstall and gives you message that “You do not have sufficient access to uninstall www-searching.com. Please, contact your system administrator” when you try to remove it from Control Panel or “Access denied” error when removing www-searching.com folder and files. This happens, because process or service does not allow you to do it. In this case I will recommend you to use SpyHunter 5 or Malwarebytes or uninstall www-searching.com in Safe Mode. To boot in Safe Mode do the following:

1. Reboot your computer.
2. While it starts booting press F8 button.
3. This will open Advanced Boot Options menu.
4. Choose Safe Mode and wait until Windows loads.
5. Go to Control Panel > Uninstall a program and remove www-searching.com or Hao123-Client

>> See detailed instructions and video tutorial on how to boot in Safe Mode

Remove malicious add-ons from your browsers

Uninstalling www-searching.com from Control Panel often does not bring desired effect. It sometimes have browser extension and it may still be active in Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. Here are instructions on how to remove www-searching.com related extension from your browsers manually.

Google Chrome:

1. Start Google Chrome browser
2. In address box type (or copy-paste) chrome://extensions/.
3. Find suspicious extensions.
4. Click the trash can icon to remove them.
5. Also remove other suspicious extensions from the list.

Mozilla Firefox:

1. Start Mozilla Firefox browser.
2. In address box type (or copy-paste) about:addons.
3. Choose suspicious extension.
4. Click Disable or Remove button.
5. Remove all suspicious extensions from the list.

Internet Explorer (9, 10, 11):

Note: There is no feature to remove browser extensions from browser in latest version of Internet Explorer. To remove www-searching.com from Internet Explorer, please, perform instructions for uninstalling program from Control Panel. To disable www-searching.com, please, do the following:

1. Open Internet Explorer.
2. Click on gear/asterisk icon in the top-right corner.
3. In opened menu Manage Add-ons.
4. Select Toolbars and Extensions.
5. Click Disable www-searching.com.
6. Also disable other suspicious extensions from the list.

Opera Browser:

Generally, www-searching.com does not install in Opera browser however you can always double check. Do the following:

1. Start Opera browser.
2. Go to Tools > Extensions > Manage Extensions.
3. Find www-searching.com extension.
4. Click Uninstall button.
5. Also remove other suspicious extensions from the list.

Reset browsers settings (homepage, default search)

www-searching.com installs search engine that hijacks your browsers. Here is instruction to reset your browsers homepage, newtab and search engine to default values.

Google Chrome:

1. Start Google Chrome browser
2. In address box type (or copy-paste) chrome://settings/.
3. Scroll down and find Show advanced settings link.
4. Click on it and scroll down to the bottom again.
5. Click Reset browser settings button and click Reset to confirm.

Mozilla Firefox:

1. Start Mozilla Firefox browser.
2. In address box type (or copy-paste) about:support.
3. Click Reset Firefox… button.
4. Click Reset Firefox to confirm.

Internet Explorer (9, 10, 11):

1. Start Internet Explorer.
2. Click on gear/asterisk icon in the top-right corner.
3. In opened menu choose Internet options.
4. Click Advanced tab.
5. Click Reset button.
6. Choose Delete personal settings and click Reset.

Opera Browser:

1. Close Opera and open command prompt from the start menu.
2. Type following command del %AppData%\Opera\Opera\operaprefs.ini
3. Start Opera.

Alternative way to remove adware browser extensions and reset browser settings

For safe and effective browser extension removal use avast! Browser Cleanup utility. Run it with administrator privileges and remove all extensions with bad rating including related to www-searching.com. You can also reset your browser settings for each of your browsers: Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox.

Download Avast Browser Cleanup

Cleaning browsers shortcuts

You can clean your browser shortcuts manually right-clicking on your browser icon, choosing “Properties” and removing hijacker address from “Target” field (leave just the path to your browser). However it is easier to use free Shortcut Cleaner from BleepingComputer. Download it here – its FREE:

Download Shortcut Cleaner

Final tips

Be careful surfing the internet and downloading software, as programs like www-searching.com may become a real headache as they are hard to remove and break your privacy. To keep safe from such threats we recommend you always use antivirus and one of antimalware programs available on the market. One of the best anti-spyware and antimalware programs is SpyHunter 5. It can protect your PC from threats like www-searching.com.