Remove Pine-this.org Homepage Hijacker

Browser hijackers are quite a pest online. These sneaky infections could take over your entire browsing experience. In the process, they expose you to various threats and irritate you on a daily basis. There is no reason to keep such a pest on your computer system. On the other hand, hijackers give you plenty of reasons to be uninstalled on the spot. The Pine-this.org Virus is a classic browser hijacker. It doesn’t deviate from the rules and is just as dangerous as all other hijackers you may come across. Immediately after your device gets compromised, the virus installs a browser extension. A malicious one. By messing with your default settings, pine-this.org injects them with sponsored web links. You see where this is going, don’t you? This program was developed by hackers to serve their purposes. It wasn’t meant to be beneficial for you in any way. Hence, the hijacker only brings along new issues and problems. Its browser extension gets added completely behind your back. Not many parasites seek the victim’s permission before they wreak havoc. Pine-this.org doesn’t need your authorization either. It keeps on altering your preferred browser settings instead. The parasite might install some additional toolbars as well. In addition, it modifies both your browser homepage and search engine. They get replaced with the hijacker’s own domain. As you could imagine, this is a domain you must stay away from. Pine-this.org is supposed to provide accurate, perfectly safe search results. Unfortunately, that is not the case.  The one thing brought to you by the parasite are sponsored, potentially corrupted web links. You see, hijackers help their creators gain profit. In order to do so, pine-this.org boosts web traffic to some particular pages. Those might or might not be dangerous. Crooks are focused on gaining profit. Your safety isn’t even remotely part of the picture so you cannot afford to trust the parasite. It hijacks your browsers and might inject them with ads too. Sponsored, obnoxious, absolutely useless ads. To top it all, pine-this.org could display fake software updates. Stay away from anything generated by this pest of a program. Chances are, all web links and pop-ups currently on your PC screen could be harmful. To prevent further damage, restrain yourself from clicking. You won’t regret it. The parasite also redirects you to unknown websites and slows your PC speed to a crawl. To sum up, pine-this.org has to go. The sooner, the better.

How did I get infected with?

Have you recently downloaded unverified software? Probably. Bundled freeware and shareware are among the most popular virus infiltration methods. Furthermore, all kinds of malicious programs use them. Pay attention to what you download in the future. We recommend opting for the Custom or Advanced option in the Setup Wizard. Take your time in the process. If you spot some unwanted “bonus” hidden there, simply deselect it. Remember that prevention is a lot easier than having to remove malware. Do yourself a favor. Watch out for infections before it’s too late and don’t underestimate any threat. Also, check out the Terms and Conditions of what you install. Same thing goes for the End User License Agreement (EULA). Rushing the installation process may seem like a good idea at the time but it is not. Unless you’re very careful, you might accidentally compromise your machine. The Web is infested with parasites so keep that in mind. You could never be too cautious online. In addition, stay away from email-attachments and spam messages from unknown senders. Delete what you don’t trust and always put your safety first.

Why is this dangerous?

The pine-this.org hijacker is aggressive. Its plugin works with all three of the most commonly used browsers out there. Yes, that means Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer are infected. Wave surfing the Internet goodbye because your browsers now generate sponsored links. This parasite effectively destroys your online activities and lies to your face at the same time. Avoid all search results, commercials, product deals and other offers you might come across. One single careless click is more than enough to let some parasites loose. The hijacker causes your browsers to freeze and crash as well. It leads to an overall poor PC performance and might mess with your Internet connection. It even monitors your browsing data. Even though that mainly includes browsing history and usernames/passwords, pine-this.org could also get to your bank account information. Needless to say, such a trick must be prevented at all cost. To delete the virus manually, please follow our detailed removal guide down below.

How to Remove Pine-this.org virus

The Pine-this.org infection is specifically designed to make money to its creators one way or another. The specialists from various antivirus companies like Bitdefender, Kaspersky, Norton, Avast, ESET, etc. advise that there is no harmless virus.

If you perform exactly the steps below you should be able to remove the Pine-this.org infection. Please, follow the procedures in the exact order. Please, consider to print this guide or have another computer at your disposal. You will NOT need any USB sticks or CDs.

WARNING! Stopping the wrong file or deleting the wrong registry key may damage your system irreversibly.
If you are feeling not technical enough just use Spyhunter Professional Malware Removal Tool to deal with the problem!
>>Download SpyHunter – a Professional Remover.

Please, keep in mind that SpyHunter’s scanner tool is free. To remove the Pine-this.org infection, you need to purchase its full version.

STEP 1: Track down Pine-this.org in the computer memory

STEP 2: Locate Pine-this.org startup location

STEP 3: Delete Pine-this.org traces from Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer

STEP 4: Undo the damage done by the virus

STEP 1: Track down Pine-this.org in the computer memory

• Open your Task Manager by pressing CTRL+SHIFT+ESC keys simultaneously
• Carefully review all processes and stop the suspicious ones.

• Write down the file location for later reference.

Step 2: Locate Pine-this.org startup location

Reveal Hidden Files

• Open any folder
• Click on “Organize” button
  
• Choose “Folder and Search Options”
• Select the “View” tab
• Select “Show hidden files and folders” option
• Uncheck “Hide protected operating system files”
• Click “Apply” and “OK” button

Clean Pine-this.org virus from the windows registry

• Once the operating system loads press simultaneously the Windows Logo Button and the R key.

• A dialog box should open. Type “Regedit”

• WARNING! be very careful when editing the Microsoft Windows Registry as this may render the system broken.

Depending on your OS (x86 or x64) navigate to:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] or
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] or
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run]

• and delete the display Name: [RANDOM]

• Then open your explorer and navigate to: %appdata% folder and delete the malicious executable.

Clean your HOSTS file to avoid unwanted browser redirection

Navigate to %windir%/system32/Drivers/etc/host

If you are hacked, there will be foreign IPs addresses connected to you at the bottom. Take a look below:

STEP 3 : Clean Pine-this.org traces from Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer

• Open Google Chrome

• In the Main Menu, select Tools then Extensions
• Remove the Pine-this.org by clicking on the little recycle bin
• Reset Google Chrome by Deleting the current user to make sure nothing is left behind

• Open Mozilla Firefox

• Press simultaneously Ctrl+Shift+A
• Disable the unwanted Extension
• Go to Help
• Then Troubleshoot information
• Click on Reset Firefox

• Open Internet Explorer

• On the Upper Right Corner Click on the Gear Icon
• Click on Internet options
• go to Toolbars and Extensions and disable the unknown extensions
• Select the Advanced tab and click on Reset

• Restart Internet Explorer

Step 4: Undo the damage done by Pine-this.org

This particular Virus may alter your DNS settings.

Attention! this can break your internet connection. Before you change your DNS settings to use Google Public DNS for Pine-this.org, be sure to write down the current server addresses on a piece of paper.

To fix the damage done by the virus you need to do the following.

• Click the Windows Start button to open the Start Menu, type control panel in the search box and select Control Panel in the results displayed above.
• go to Network and Internet
• then Network and Sharing Center
• then Change Adapter Settings
• Right-click on your active internet connection and click properties. Under the Networking tab, find Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4). Left click on it and then click on properties. Both options should be automatic! By default it should be set to “Obtain an IP address automatically” and the second one to “Obtain DNS server address automatically!” If they are not just change them, however if you are part of a domain network you should contact your Domain Administrator to set these settings, otherwise the internet connection will break!!!

You must clean all your browser shortcuts as well. To do that you need to

• Right click on the shortcut of your favorite browser and then select properties.

• in the target field remove Pine-this.org argument and then apply the changes.
• Repeat that with the shortcuts of your other browsers.
• Check your scheduled tasks to make sure the virus will not download itself again.

How to Permanently Remove Pine-this.org Virus (automatic) Removal Guide

Please, have in mind that once you are infected with a single virus, it compromises your system and let all doors wide open for many other infections. To make sure manual removal is successful, we recommend to use a free scanner of any professional antimalware program to identify possible registry leftovers or temporary files.