Cannot remove "Fastsearch" chrome hijacker

[Aesthetica]

Hey everyone,

This is the first time I've had to inquire about malware in a long time.

My Chrome browser (on Mac High Sierra) gets hijacked by an entity called "Fastsearch" which opens whenever I open a new tab or window.

I've ran updated Malware Bytes to no avail as it doesn't find anything. I've deleted chrome's application support files and reinstalled Chrome but the issue persists. I'm starting to think it's another application or something else that is actively installing this malicious extension to new iterations of Chrome when installed.

 

If anyone could give me any insight into this I would massively appreciate it as it's starting to really bother me.

Thanks so much for reading!

[alvarnell]

Did you read through and try all the suggestions in the pinned article at the top of the forum?

 

[Aesthetica]

2 hours ago, alvarnell said:

Did you read through and try all the suggestions in the pinned article at the top of the forum?

 

 

As a matter of fact, I did. I completely nuked Chrome and there are no configuration profiles on the computer so at this point I'm rather mystified.

[alvarnell]

From your description, it sounded like it might be this specific part of that article.

[alvarnell]

I'm still trying to see if there is a similar setting in Chrome.

[adanielled]

I am having the exact same issue and like alvarnell have taken all the steps mentioned in the linked post. 

[philipjgolden68]

i also cannot get this fast search to go away in chrome. i have scanned with malwarebytes and with avast. neither did anything. i have been through countless articles, gone through go to folders in finder, etc. AURGGGGHHH!!! so aggravating. 

[cj1]

I'm having the same problem. Tried everything suggested.

[alvarnell]

Evidently something new. The staff won't show up for several hours, so in the meanwhile you can open a Support Ticket at Contact Us.

[AdvancedSetup]

I don't own a Mac to verify how to clean, but we do this type of cleaning often on Windows. Basically it boils down to settings in Chrome that if you delete the sync and change settings as shown in the article posted below (this was written for Windows, not Mac) it may help you.

Again, this article was written to address Google Chrome, on Windows, but may possibly help on Mac.

 

Thank you

Ron

 

 

[Aesthetica]

UPDATE:

After nuking chrome again, it appears that Fastsearch is no more! I must've missed something the first time around. This time I also ended any and all Google processes running in the background.

Steps:

1. Close chrome and force quit chromium and chrome/google processes in Activity Monitor.
2. Completely Erase all of these files and folders (thanks treed for this info):

/Applications/Chrome.app
/Library/Application Support/Google/
/Library/Google/
~/Library/Application Support/Google/
~/Library/Google/
~/Library/Preferences/com.google.Chrome.plist

3. Restart computer.

4. Download and reinstall fresh Chrome.

5. Profit. RIP Fastsearch.

 

Hope this helps, guys. I'm going to add this to my original post. Thanks for all your suggestions.

 

 

 

[adanielled]

I tried these recommendations and am still stuck with FastSearch. I did notice that once I deleted the application I didn't have any of the files or folders Aesthetica  lists. I'm wondering if I should un-sync my Chrome browser and export my bookmarks as an HTML file. 

[AdvancedSetup]

Yes, if you leave Chrome synced, even if you clean the computer it will come back from the Cloud via Sync

 

[silverfoil]

On 9/27/2018 at 4:02 PM, Aesthetica said:

UPDATE:

After nuking chrome again, it appears that Fastsearch is no more! I must've missed something the first time around. This time I also ended any and all Google processes running in the background.

Steps:

1. Close chrome and force quit chromium and chrome/google processes in Activity Monitor.
2. Completely Erase all of these files and folders (thanks treed for this info):

/Applications/Chrome.app
/Library/Application Support/Google/
/Library/Google/
~/Library/Application Support/Google/
~/Library/Google/
~/Library/Preferences/com.google.Chrome.plist

3. Restart computer.

4. Download and reinstall fresh Chrome.

5. Profit. RIP Fastsearch.

 

Hope this helps, guys. I'm going to add this to my original post. Thanks for all your suggestions.

 

 

 

I too had tried "everything" -- including following every step to the letter nuking Chrome and trying Malware, Norton, DetectX, CleanMyMac, et. al.   

[silverfoil]

Nothing worked except following Aesthetica list of steps.

Thank you Aesthetica

[adanielled]

Anyone else following all these steps and still cannot remove?