What is Search Genie?
It probably took you a while to notice that Search Genie is there on your Chrome browser. Or maybe you opened this page right after the extension was added. Whichever it is, welcome to our website. We are here to tell you more about this potentially unwanted program, and what you should do about it.
First, we would like to emphasize that Search Genie is not a malicious computer infection. It is just an extension that works on one browser. But it has certain features that can be deemed undesirable, and thus, it is recommended that you remove it from your browser.
Where does Search Genie come from?
There are several ways for this browser extension to reach your system. It has an official homepage that you should be able to reach through searchfrit.com, but it doesn’t seem to be available at the time of writing. Also, it is very likely that the page opens only when you access it via Google Chrome. Either way, it is very unlikely that the official website would work as a distribution source because it looks more like a search engine gateway.
Next, we can find this extension on the Chrome Web Store. The application is listed under Search Tools, and it says that with the app added to your browser, you can “get fast access to images, news, videos, shopping maps and recipes.” Everything sounds nice, right? But then again, why would you need a third-party extension when you can always just google it?
So here comes another distribution method, and it is very likely that this is how Search Genie entered your PC. Our research team says that this app tends to come through redirects. For example, when you access some website, there are times when a pop-up jumps into your screen, or suddenly there is another tab on your browser that redirects you to some commercial website. This new tab also comes with a prompt to add some tool to your browser. This is the type of redirect that distributes Search Genie, too.
For the most part, it is possible to ignore these redirects and simply decline to add the extension if you do not want it. But some users might be too confused or too distracted to notice this, and they click the “Add” button automatically. As a result, Search Genie enters the Chrome browser.
What does Search Genie do?
Some users might think that they get infected with a browser hijacker when this extension enters their system because Search Genie changes the default search engine to feed.searchfrit.com. It might look that this extension could provide you with reliable and relevant search results, but if we were to run a search query, we would soon see that all of our queries are redirected to a modified Yahoo! Search page. So it means that Search Genie cannot offer you anything original. What’s more, a modified Yahoo! Search page means that this extension might monitor your online activities to provide you with custom content.
Custom content is not bad per se, but it is often impossible to tell how Search Genie and other similar applications share the data they collect from their customers. Also, these apps often do not and cannot review the content of third-party websites, so if they are used for their advertising space, sometimes they might inadvertently display links that redirect you to corrupted websites. Of course, if you do not click those links, no harm is done. But since the possibility is there, it should go without saying that you have to remove Search Genie from your system.
How do I remove Search Genie?
Luckily, it is very simple to get rid of this extension. You just need to delete it through the Chrome settings. On the other hand, we mustn’t forget that sometimes several programs are distributed in the same way, so what if there are more unwanted apps installed on your PC?
How can you find them all? Simply scan your PC with the SpyHunter free scanner and check the scan results. If there are more unwanted applications on your computer, be sure to remove them all. Although these apps are not immediate system security threats, they could still cause some trouble in the long run.
Manual Search Genie Removal
- Launch the Chrome browser.
- Press Alt+F and select More tools.
- Click Extensions.
- Press the Remove button next to Search Genie.
- Restart the browser.
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