What is Weather Hub?
Weather Hub may seem to you a useful and spectacular browser extension that provides you with a nice background, a toolbar, local weather information, and a search engine as well. What a package! Until you find out that this is actually a browser hijacker that is capable of presenting to you unreliable third-party content through its modified search results. What’s more, our malware researchers at anti-spyware-101.com say that this malware infection can enter your computer with a company of other threats as well, which can seriously increase the vulnerability of your virtual security. We suggest that you do not keep this browser hijacker on your system because you might land on malicious websites and become a victim of online scams if you engage with its content. In fact, we recommend that you remove Weather Hub as soon as possible. At the end of our article, we will share our solution to protect your computer from this and similar threats. But now, let us tell you what we have found in relation to this potentially harmful browser extension.
Where does Weather Hub come from?
It seems that this questionable browser extension comes from Saphire Max Media Co. Ltd., in Thailand as the legal document called Terms reveals. Our research shows that this browser hijacker is mostly popular in the following countries: Germany, Turkey, and Russia. But, of course, you can install it from anywhere around the globe really. The most likely way for you to see this infection show up in your affected browsers, including Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome, is to install it after you download a free software bundle. Of course, it is also possible that you install it directly after you click on an unsafe third-party advertisement or modified web search result, but schemers usually like to promote bundled threats instead of single ones.
There are mainly two scenarios that can present you with such an unreliable link or advertisement. First, your system could be infected with adware programs and browser hijackers. Second, you may look for a free file to download, such as a free program, movie, music, and book, and you click on the wrong search result that may take you to a fake file-sharing website full of unsafe third-party content. Landing on such pages – not only file-sharing but also gaming, gambling, and pornography-related sites – can confuse you and you may click on the wrong content, including pop-up and banner ads. This can easily drop a malicious package onto your system. And, this is exactly why we suggest that you delete Weather Hub from your system as well as all other related malware infections you may be able to identify on your computer.
Of course, this browser extension also has a promotional page where you can directly install the official version. You can find it at weather-hub.com, but we do not think that too many computer users would end up on this site unless they are redirected to it under questionable conditions or somehow they learn about this URL.
How does Weather Hub work?
To be quite frank, we cannot claim that this browser extension does not work properly at all. We have found that most of its “extras,” such as the easy-access links on its pseudo-toolbar and the local weather update and forecast below the search field work just fine. But we cannot tell this about the search engine, unfortunately. We do not advise you to use this search engine because you could be exposed to potentially unreliable content. In fact, this browser hijacker sends all your searches to ultimatesearchweb.com or blpsearch.com first, which are both potentially unreliable search engines. In this case they serve as mediators of some sort and forward your queries to a Yahoo search results page. However, by the time you land on this final results page, chances are it will contain unsafe content, such as third-party ads and links. Unfortunately, cyber crooks can exploit this hijacker and inject their infected links and ads into these results pages. If you click on these, you may open malicious pages on new tabs or directly drop infections onto your computer. It is highly recommended to avoid malicious websites because you can be scammed out of your money quite easily before you realize it. Therefore, you should not hesitate to remove Weather Hub from your system even if it may seem all innocent right now.
How do I delete Weather Hub?
We wish we could tell you that you just need to run an uninstaller and this threat would go away without any leftovers. To be frank, it could be possible if you installed the official version. Then, you can even try to use the built-in menu that you can display by clicking on the tiny cloud icon at the top of your browser window. Select the “Remove from Chrome” menu item and click Remove. If you do not trust this method, you can reset both affected browsers. However, if you have the bundled version, this will not fully remove Weather Hub from your system. Therefore, follow our guide we shared below this article and you should be able to put an end to this infection in a few minutes even if you are not an expert user.
Remove Weather Hub from your browsers
Mozilla Firefox
- Press Alt+H and go to Troubleshooting Information.
- Click Refresh Firefox and in the confirmation window, click Refresh Firefox.
- Press Finish.
Google Chrome
- Press Alt+F and go to Settings.
- Scroll down and click Show advanced settings.
- Scroll down and click Reset settings at the bottom.
- Click Reset.
Remove leftovers
- Press Win+Q and type regedit. Hit Enter.
- Remove the following registry keys:
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Google\Chrome\Extensions\kbejacapfbbfcbonimhhmpdbbpjdoplf
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Google\Chrome\Extensions\kbejacapfbbfcbonimhhmpdbbpjdoplf - Exit the registry editor.
- Press Win+E.
- Bin the following folders if you find them:
%PROGRAMFILES%\WeatherHub
%PROGRAMFILES(x86)%\WeatherHub - Empty your Recycle Bin.
tested removal of Weather Hub*
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