If you can hardly navigate through your web pages and your browsing gets constantly interrupted by dozens of advertisements, banners, pop-ups, and automatic page-redirects, then there is a great possibility that you are dealing with a Browser Hijacker. And more specifically, a new Browser Hijacker representative, called Procontent.me. These kinds of programs are notorious for the intrusive and unwanted advertisements they can display on your Chrome, Firefox, Explorer or any other browser, as well as the modifications they tend to apply to the homepage or the search engine settings.
The moment Procontent.me gets installed on your system, a brand new browser homepage or a new toolbar may substitute your present one and you may start to get automatic redirects to some different tabs full with deals and pay-per-click advertisements. Fortunately, on this page, we will show you exactly how to remove them and safely uninstall their source.
To do so, you will need to closely follow the steps in the removal manual below, as they will help you to identify and manually remove all Procontent.me associated records and their traces. When you’re done, you won’t see all these banners and posts popping up anymore and you’d be able to restore the original browser settings. But before scrolling down to the removal manual, it’s essential to get acquainted with the specifics of this kind of programs.
Is Procontent.me a virus or a malware?
When random ads start popping up all over your screen and automatic page redirects prevent you from visiting the pages you want, you may naturally think that some strange malware that has probably invaded your machine and has initiated those activities without your knowledge or approval. This, however, is not the case when you are facing a program like Procontent.me. There is a big distinction between Browser Hijackers and real internet threats such as viruses, Ransomware, Trojans or Spyware. In fact, you can’t even compare them. A Browser Hijacker, generally, can’t initiate any direct damaging activity on your machine. At its worst, such software can only spam you with sponsored ads, pay-per-click banners and pop-ups. Security experts even see it as one of the relatively harmless applications that you could land, because it can’t destroy your files or damage you system. A real Ransomware, on the other hand, not only can secretly compromise the computer but also can take hostage of all your data and ask you to pay a ransom for it.
However, we won’t be truly accurate if we don’t point out the potential risks of keeping a Browser Hijacker on the computer for long. For Instance, there is still a small chance you bump into threats because the online crooks are constantly using new techniques to infect unsuspecting web users. One of their most common methods is known as malvertising and we should warn you about it. This infection method is based on the distribution of malicious ads and attractive offers in the form of random pop-ups along with other legitimate advertisements.
If you happen to click on such compromised ad, and that may happen if you let a program like Procontent.me to spam your screen with various random advertisements, you may land on some malware or get redirected to illegal web locations where you could get infected. Therefore, to eliminate that risk, it is best to uninstall Procontent.me from your computer with the help of the instructions below.
SUMMARY:
| Name | Procontent.me |
| Type | Browser Hijacker |
| Danger Level | Medium (nowhere near threats like Ransomware, but still a security risk) |
| Symptoms | Different annoying pop-ups, banners and ads may start spamming your screen. |
| Distribution Method | Spam and software bundling are common distribution methods for many browser hijackers. |
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Procontent.me Virus Removal
Procontent.me Android Removal guide
Procontent.me Mac Removal guide.
The following guide is only for windows users, it will help our readers get rid of the unpleasant Procontent.me software. Follow the instructions and complete each step for best results. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them using our comment section down below.
Preparation: Entering Safe Mode and Revealing Hidden Files and Folders
Before you proceed with the actual removal instructions, you will need to take two extra steps in order to ensure that the guide has maximum effect.
For best results, we advise our readers to boot into Safe Mode prior to attempting to remove Procontent.me. If you do not know how to do that, here is a separate How to Enter Safe Mode guide.
Also, in order to be able to see any potentially undesirable files, you should reveal any hidden files and folders on your PC – here is how to do that.
Removing Procontent.me From Windows
Step 1: Checking the Task Manager
Before we start deleting files related to Procontent.me we want to make sure that all services related to the viruses are killed before we proceed.
Open your Task Manager by using the Ctrl + Shift + Esc keys and go to the Processes tab. Look for any suspicious processes. For example, any unfamiliar process that uses high amounts of RAM and/or CPU. If you aren’t sure if a certain process comes from malware, tell us in the comments.
Right-click on any process that you consider shady and select Open File Location. Delete anything from the file location of the process.
Step 2: Disabling Startup programs
Use the Winkey + R keyboard combination to open the Run search bar and type msconfig. Hit Enter and in the newly opened window, go to the Startup tab. There, look for suspicious entries with unknown manufacturer or ones that have the name Procontent.me on them. Right-click on those, and select disable.
Step 3: Uninstalling unwanted programs
Go to Start Menu > Control Panel > Uninstall a Program. Click on Installed On to sort the entries by date from most recent to oldest and look through the programs that come at the top of the list. Right-click on any entries that appear shady and unwanted and then select Uninstall to remove them from your PC. If you see the name Procontent.me in the list of programs, be sure to remove the software without hesitation.
Step 4: Checking for shady IP’s
Open your Start Menu and copy-paste notepad %windir%/system32/Drivers/etc/hosts in the search bar. In the notepad file, look below Localhost and see if there are any IP addresses there. If there are some, send them to us in the comments and we will tell you if you should take any action. [add_forth_banner]
Step 5: Cleaning-up the browsers
You will also have to uninstall any undesirable browser extensions from your browser programs. Here’s how to do that for some of the more popular browsers:
Getting rid of Procontent.me from Chrome
Open Chrome and open its main menu. Go to More Tools > Extensions. Look through the list of extensions and uninstall any that you think could be suspicious. To remove them – click on the trash can icon next to each extension.
You can also use a specialized Chrome CleanUp tool if you cannot manually remove a certain extension. Here is an article where you can learn more about the CleanUp tool.
Removing Procontent.me From Firefox
Open Firefox and go to its Menu. Select the Add-ons button.From the left panel, select Extensions and take a look at the different entries. Remove any of the that might be unwanted.
Removing Procontent.me From Windows Internet Explorer
Once you open your IE browser, click on the Tools button at the top-right corner of the program and from the drop-down menu select Manage Add-ons. Check each one of the four different groups of add-ons and search for anything that seems undesirable. If you find anything, click on it and them select Remove.
Removing Procontent.me From Windows Edge
Open the main menu of Microsoft Edge and go to Extensions. Find the extensions that you believe could be unwanted and right-click on them. Then, select Uninstall.
Step 6: Checking the Registry Editor
Open the Run search bar again and type regedit in it. Hit Enter and once the Registry Editor opens press Ctrl + F. In the search field type Procontent.me and click on Find Next. Tell us in the comments if any results came up when you searched for Procontent.me in your PC’s Registry.
Step 7: Deleting recent entries
For this step, you will have to open your Start Menu and copy-paste the following lines, one by one:
- %AppData%
- %LocalAppData%
- %ProgramData%
- %WinDir%
- %Temp%
Hit Enter after each one to open a file directory. In the directories, delete the most recent entries that you find there. In the Temp folder, delete all files.
Step 8: System Restore
In order to be fully sure that the unwanted software has been removed from your machine, you can also try using a Restore Point to roll back your system its last stable configuration. However, in order to do that, you would have to previously had had a restore point created. On most systems, such points get created automatically but this isn’t always the case.
- If you want to learn how to configure System Restore and how to manually create Restore Points, follow this link.
- Open your Start Menu and type System Restore.
- Click on the first result – a setup wizard should open.
- Read the brief description of the process and select Next.
- Now, choose a restore from the presented list. You can also check the Show more restore points option in order to reveal any other restore points that might be saved on your PC.
- Click on Scan for affected programs to see what programs will get deleted or restored after you use the Restore Point. (optional)
- Click on next and take and then select Finish.
- A warning window will appear telling you that once the process starts, it shouldn’t be interrupted. Select Yes and be patient as this might take some time. Do not do anything on your PC throughout the duration of the process.
Step 9: Windows Refresh/Reset
Use this method only if nothing else has worked so far as it is a last resort option. If you do not know how to do it, this separate guide will give you the information that you need.
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