Do you know what Search.theweathercenter.co is?
Search.theweathercenter.co may show up in your major browsers, including Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Internet Explorer, after a browser hijacker crawls onto your computer. This threat may be a new one but definitely not without predecessors. In fact, our researchers found that this browser hijacker is virtually an identical clone of Search.yourweatherhub.com and very similar to dozens of other hijackers from the same family. This search page offers you quick links to weather-related websites and, of course, a search engine. Our experience with this family and our tests show that you should not trust anything that comes from or through this search page. As a matter of fact, you should remove Search.theweathercenter.co if you do not want a malware invasion to take place on your computer. Unfortunately, you may be late for that since this hijacker could have brought a number of other threats on board. For the details, please go on reading our article.
Although you can find a promotional page (theweathercenter.co/weather?) to install this useless browser extension, there is little chance that you would end up there on purpose or from reliable sources. However, if you happen to land on this page and you are using Google Chrome, you will be surprised when you click on the “Start Download” button because nothing happens. So if you find this browser hijacker in your Chrome, it is quite possible that it sneaked onto your computer in questionable ways. Of course, you could not even install such a potentially harmful extension if you had proper security software defending your system all the time.
Search.theweathercenter.co screenshot
Scroll down for full removal instructions
To be frank, the most likely way in which this threat can show up in your browsers is for you to click on the wrong content. This means that when you click on random third-party advertisements, you may install this search page unknowingly or you can also drop a whole package of malware threats onto your system. If there is one single adware program or browser hijacker on your computer, you can never be fully safe anytime you go online. These infections can expose you to unsafe third-party commercials and links that can lead to more infections on your computer or redirecting to malicious websites where you could also infect your PC. If you allow a bundle of malware programs onto your system, you simply multiply the danger factors and increase the vulnerability of your virtual world. This is why we advise you to run a proper system malware scan to find all questionable applications right after you delete Search.theweathercenter.co from your computer.
Our tests show that this browser hijacker works exactly the same way as its “siblings,” including Search.yourtelevisioncenter.com, Search.easyvideoconverteraccess.com, and Search.yourinstantfileconverter.com. The main goal of this questionable browser extension is to make money for its creators by generating web traffic to affiliated websites. In this endeavor, this browser hijacker may inject its third parties’ advertisements into the offered linked pages that are available from a fake toolbar at the top of this search page. These links are related to local weather forecast. However, the pages you land on by clicking on these could host potentially unreliable third-party ads.
Unfortunately, we cannot tell you anything good about the search engine itself either. Your keywords are forwarded to Yahoo but what you will see on your screen is indeed modified results. This means that this browser hijacker can insert third-party ads and links among the normal results. However, this makes such a results page a landmine field because you will not be able to distinguish between a legitimate ad or website link and a malicious one. This is how a lot of users let malware infections on board. One click on an unreliable ad or link and you could drop a threat onto your system or directly install this hijacker. But you can easily open a few malicious webpages as well on new tabs or new windows. Since there is a chance that by using this search engine you may be scammed by cyber criminals, we suggest that you act now and delete Search.theweathercenter.co from your system.
Since the uninstaller of this browser hijacker only seems to take care of Internet Explorer, you need to manually reset the other two browsers if you want to make sure that this and all other unwanted browser setting changes and questionable extensions are eliminated in one go. If you need help with these, please find our instructions below this article. If this hijacker managed to infiltrate your computer, it also means that your guard was down and it may not be the first or last time. If this happens again, you may let even more dangerous threats on board, such as ransomware programs. This is why we recommend that you consider installing a trustworthy anti-malware program, such as SpyHunter.
How to remove Search.theweathercenter.co from Windows
Windows XP
- Tap Win+R and type Control Panel. Click OK.
- Choose Add or Remove Programs.
- Click on the application and press Remove.
Windows Vista and Windows 7
- Open the Start menu and pick Control Panel.
- Select Uninstall a program.
- Click on the application and press Uninstall.
Windows 8, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10
- Tap Win+R and type in Control Panel. Press OK.
- Select Uninstall a program.
- Click on the application in the list and press Uninstall.
How to remove Search.theweathercenter.co from browsers
Google Chrome
- Tap Alt+F and select Settings.
- Scroll down and click Show advanced settings.
- Scroll down and click Reset settings.
- Press Reset in the confirmation window.
Mozilla Firefox
- Tap Alt+H and select Troubleshooting Information.
- Press Refresh Firefox.
- In the confirmation window, press Refresh Firefox.
- Click Finish.
In non-techie terms:
Search.theweathercenter.co is a newly emerged search engine that raises a few questions about its reliability. In fact, our researchers say that this infection is a browser hijacker as it can change certain browser settings, including home page, new tab page, and default search engine. If you find this hijacker in your browsers, there is also a good chance that there are a few more malicious programs on board since this potential threat tends to travel with a company. Since this browser hijacker may introduce you to unreliable third-party web content and it may bring multiple risk sources onto your system, we advise you to remove Search.theweathercenter.co and all other related and non-related malware infections as well. If you want proper protection for your PC, we suggest that you start employing a reliable malware removal application.