Do you know what ScenicHomepage Toolbar is?
ScenicHomepage Toolbar is a potentially unwanted program, although you may also find it listed under browser toolbars and even browser hijackers. It depends on the category system a security website or a security application uses. The bottom line is that this program is a potential system security issue. It may not be a direct security threat, but, in many cases, it gets installed on the target computer accidentally, and then users scramble to remove ScenicHomepage Toolbar from their systems. Lucky for you, we have come up with the manual removal instructions you can find right below this description.
How can we tell a malicious infection apart from just a potentially unwanted program (PUP)? Well, a malicious infection will definitely enter your computer surreptitiously, while a PUP will give you the option to either install it or not. What’s more, PUPs and other similar applications tend to have official websites with working download buttons. ScenicHomepage Toolbar is no exception. We can download this extension directly from scenichomepage.com. So when a program does not hide from you, it is clear that it is a not malicious infection. On the other hand, sometimes even seemingly benevolent apps may cause quite a lot of harm.
Now you are probably wondering why we are so wary of this application. That is mostly because ScenicHomepage Toolbar belongs to the Mindspark Toolbars family. It is an ever-growing group of potentially unwanted programs, and we have been dealing with members of this family for many years now. All programs from this group look like they can provide users with some useful feature or function, but once we dig deeper; we find that these applications are practically identical. Ultimately, all of the programs from this group are created to generate a financial profit for their developers.
Therefore, we can expect ScenicHomepage Toolbar to behave just like Converters Now Toolbar, MyFileConvert Toolbar, InternetSpeedRadar Toolbar, and so on. Of course, these programs cannot steal your financial information or banking logins and passwords. However, there are ways for such programs to make money for their creators. They do that by displaying commercial content in hopes that you would interact with that content by clicking it. Is it safe to interact with such content? Computer security experts strongly recommend against that. Although the program does not try to infect you with malware, it also cannot vouch for the third-party content it promotes.
What’s more, ScenicHomepage Toolbar may also exhibit particular behavioral patterns you may not like at all. Remember, we said that some security websites might categorize this program like a browser hijacker, too. That is, because upon installation, the toolbar will change your homepage and your new tab settings on your default browser. If you were not aware of the fact you installed the application on your PC, this might look like a genuine browser hijack. The program will inform you about the oncoming changes, but the sad part is that most of the users ignore such notices and simply breeze through the installation.
What are the implications of having your browser settings changed? Well, for the most part, it means that ScenicHomepage Toolbar will track your online activity. It will use tracking cookies to figure out the websites you visit and the queries you enter into the search engine. This information allows the program to generate your online profile and, consequently, your likes and preferences help the application to launch a custom commercial campaign right at you. So the next time you see various commercial ads on your browser, the chances are that they will be modified according to the data collected by this application.
There are certain security risks behind such advertising. As mentioned, ScenicHomepage Toolbar does not check the reliability of the third-party commercial content, so some of the ads may inadvertently redirect you to dangerous websites. Also, having an application you did not want is genuinely annoying.
Hence, you should not suffer this any longer. Remove ScenicHomepage Toolbar from your system, and then scan it with the SpyHunter free scanner. We believe that you may have more undesirable programs on-board, so you need to make sure that you terminate them all at once. Invest in a reliable antispyware program that will take care of your system for you.
How to Remove ScenicHomepage Toolbar
Internet Explorer
- Press Win+R and type Control Panel. Click OK.
- Go to Uninstall a program (or Add or remove programs for Windows XP).
- Highlight ScenicHomepage Internet Explorer Homepage and New Tab.
- Click Uninstall.
Chrome
- Press Win+R and type %LocalAppData%. Click OK.
- Go to Google\Chrome\User Data\[PROFILE]\Extensions.
- Delete the hhcmkedemkpbakpjdmpacbelgplbmg.
- Open Google\Chrome\User Data\[PROFILE]\Local Extension Settings.
- Remove the hhcmkedemkpbakpjdmpacbelgplbmgaf folder.
- Go to Google\Chrome\User Data\[PROFILE]\Sync Extension Settings.
- Delete hhcmkedemkpbakpjdmpacbelgplbmgaf.
Firefox
- Press Win+R and type %AppData%. Click OK.
- Open Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\[PROFILE]\extensions.
- Delete _hqMembers_@free.scenichomepage.com.
- Go back to Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\[PROFILE].
- Delete ScenicHomepage_hq.
In non-techie terms:
Usually, programs like ScenicHomepage Toolbar do not look dangerous. They are not particularly malicious either, but computer security experts strongly recommend removing them from the affected systems because they are really vulnerable to third-party exploitations. As a result, these programs could accidentally expose you to corrupted content, and it could eventually lead to a malware infection. Therefore, the sooner you delete ScenicHomepage Toolbar, the better.