Bing Redirect Virus on a Mac

[Rick-Ewa]

I've run Malwarebytes on my MacPro to remove a malware known as "Bing Redirect Virus" that redirects Chrome's designated search engine, Google to Bing. Malwarebytes did not remove the Bing Redirect. I installed Malwarebytes Browser Guard, restarted the computer, and that did not make a difference. Thanks for any advice. 

[alvarnell]

Every instance of the so called "Bing Redirect Virus" turned out to be something the user allowed, not realizing it would change their search engine in the process. It's not a virus and probably shouldn't even be considered malware, but rather a PUP.

It may be a Chrome extension that you installed, so I would start by disabling/removing any extensions that you don't recall having installed. If that doesn't solve the problem try disabling all and adding them back until you find the culprit. You may need to change your search engine settings back to whatever you prefer before testing these steps.

If all else fails, take a look at this pinned article, scroll down to "Nuke Chrome" and follow those steps.

Staff may request additional information about your setup be sent privately to them to track down the culprit.

[Rick-Ewa]

47 minutes ago, alvarnell said:

Every instance of the so called "Bing Redirect Virus" turned out to be something the user allowed, not realizing it would change their search engine in the process. It's not a virus and probably shouldn't even be considered malware, but rather a PUP.

It may be a Chrome extension that you installed, so I would start by disabling/removing any extensions that you don't recall having installed. If that doesn't solve the problem try disabling all and adding them back until you find the culprit. You may need to change your search engine settings back to whatever you prefer before testing these steps.

If all else fails, take a look at this pinned article, scroll down to "Nuke Chrome" and follow those steps.

Staff may request additional information about your setup be sent privately to them to track down the culprit.

 

[Rick-Ewa]

Thanks for the help. I did as you suggested - removed Extensions from Chrome - then trashed Chrome and reinstalled it - then reset settings. -  still getting the Bing search engine. I could not locate the "pinned article" you referred to. I'm glad to go to Nuke Chrome and follow the steps. Can you direct me to the pinned article please? 

[alvarnell]

Sorry about that. I had it on my clipboard and forgot to paste it here: 

 

[treed]

Let us know if the suggestions on the page Al has linked to don't work. It's likely that what you're seeing are just the after-effects of some kind of adware. We can remove the adware, but can't reverse some of the changes adware makes without risking the potential corruption of your browser settings, or loss of legit settings. (Also, Apple and Google have made efforts to make it more difficult to manipulate the settings in Safari and Chrome.)

However, there's no such thing as 100% perfect detection, so it's always possible we've missed something. In such a case, we've got a script that can collect some information from your machine to help us identify potentially missed items.

[1PW]

Hello @jfreidbe and :

Before the experts weigh in, please describe the system's:

1. Full system hardware details. (Model and Hardware Identifier) e.g., 2019 iMac19,1
2. macOS version. e.g., macOS 13.4.1 (c) Ventura.
3. Version levels of Firefox and Chrome.

Thank you.