360 Safety Guard is a fake antivirus program. Dangerous enough for a PC: it has a built-in Trojan virus. Finds and uses OS vulnerabilities to expand its functional priorities and obtain user data. Spread through social engineering as “ free solution to protect your computer ". And also through a disguised installation (like worms and trojans) - without the user's consent.
The declared "capabilities" of 360 Safety Guard are nothing more than a fake (fiction). The lot of this "digital product" is exclusively malicious activity and the prevention of the installation of trusted antiviruses. In particular, this concerns Kaspersky Internet Security (due to software incompatibility). Regardless of how the rogue anti-virus got into the system, it is imperative to remove it.
Removal with Remove Fake Antivirus
Remove Fake Antivirus does not provide PC basic protection from malware. His specialization is the removal of false antiviruses from the computer. Latest version utility (1.99 - April 2014) has a fairly long track record of fake software which she can delete. A total of 90 items.
1. Open the program's offsite (page - http://freeofvirus.blogspot.com/2009/05/remove-fake-antivirus-10.html).
2. Under the list of detected rogue anti-viruses, follow the link "CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD".
3. Wait for the download to finish. Double-click the utility to run the utility.
4. Press "YES" at the prompt of the utility "Start to remove virus?" (Start virus removal).
5. After completing the scan and uninstalling 360 Safety Guard, restart your PC.
6. Clean up file directories and registry Windows program CCleaner.
7. Update the database of the installed (main) antivirus and check all disk partitions for malware. Or install security software from another developer (the current antivirus may not be effective because it could not remove 360 Safety Guard).
How to uninstall manually?
1. Type taskmgr on the Start bar and press ENTER.
2. In the dispatcher window Windows tasks go to the "Processes" tab.
3. Find the “safetyguard.exe” file (or a variant with a similar name). Click on it right click... Select "Open storage location ..." from the context menu.
4. Save the path to the folder of the false virus in text file(you will need to return to this directory later).
Attention! Usually the virus is registered in Program Files, in the Safety Guard Software folder. And in "Common Programs" (with the same name).
5. Return to the task manager and right-click on the safetyguard.exe again. And then select End Process.
6. Restart your PC in safe mode(hold the F8 key while rebooting).
7. Find the folder of the false virus (follow the path saved in the file): and delete it, including all files in it.
8. To remove the 360 Safety Guard items left after deleting its main directory, go to the Windows registry editor ("Start" → regedit).
9. Start the "Find ..." function (section of the "Edit" menu).
10.In search bar enter SafetyGuard. All found entries with the name of the virus must be removed.
Attention! Quite often, it is registered in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ registry key.
11. Restart Windows normally. Scan the disk for viruses with disinfecting utilities (for example, Dr.WebCureIT!)
Use only trusted antivirus software. Download their installers only on the official developer sites.
360 Total Security is an anti-virus application developed in China, but the way it is distributed sometimes resembles exactly the behavior of malware and adware: the software is embedded in the installers of other products. A user who has not looked at the installer's parameters discovers a new and often unnecessary program on his computer, the uninstallation of which often causes difficulties. Read about how to remove 360 Total Security in the article.
Product description
The application has a built-in antivirus with the well-known Avira engine and the less popular Bitdefender. In addition, the utility has tools such as a built-in firewall, a cloud protection system, and blocking suspicious sites.
The developers claim that the product competes successfully with many commercial programs, and free utilities when compared, they are not even taken into account.
360 Total Security in Russian comes in two modifications. The first includes only the means to protect your computer. The second has the word Essential in its title. In addition to the above, it is designed to optimize your computer and clean operating system from debris.
There is, however, a fly in the ointment in the ointment. When the user decides that he does not need the utility and tries to uninstall it, errors appear in the seemingly standard process: the uninstall functions are completed without any result. The antivirus has built-in protection, and because of it, the lion's share of problems appears. The utility protects itself from viruses so well that it does not give the required level of access even for its own uninstaller.
How to remove 360 Total Security manually
You don't need to have the technical skills of a sysadmin to erase all application files, even a child can handle it. The only requirement that must be met is that all actions must be performed in the same sequence as given in the instructions.
- Double click on the antivirus icon in the Windows tray.
- The main program window will be displayed on the screen. Go to settings and expand the "General" menu. Uncheck the box next to the inscriptions "Enable self-defense" and "Disable active protection".
- In the Active Protection menu, check that the Enable Protection at System Boot option is disabled.
- Close the main application window.
- Click on the icon in the tray with the right mouse button.
- Select "Exit" from the drop-down list. This inscription is at the very bottom. Antivirus 360 Total Security will warn you that after this operation your computer will remain unprotected and will ask if you really want to close the program. Confirm your choice.
- Expand the Start menu and go to Control Panel.
- Find the subsection "Programs" and click on this inscription.
- Find the line 360 Total Security in the list, click on it and click on the "Remove" button that appears.
- The display will show the standard uninstaller window. In it, all that remains is to click on "Continue", and after the completion of the process - on "OK".
How to Remove 360 Total Security: Erase Leftover Files
- Restart the computer, otherwise it will not work to clear the remnants of the antivirus files - the directory will be closed for writing, and an error will appear on the screen.
- Open File Explorer by clicking on the Computer icon or by pressing the Win + E key combination.
- Go to the C: \ Program Files folder. If your PC has a 64-bit system, the numbers 86 will be appended to the directory name.
- Move your cursor over text box 360, right-click and select Delete.
Cleaning the system registry
In the process, antivirus 360 Total Security creates entries in windows registry... However, they are not deleted during uninstallation. Theoretically, you can also get rid of them manually, but in practice, a complete study of the lines with the settings in the regedit editor built into the OS takes a lot of time. Best to take advantage of third party application CCleaner. The utility is distributed absolutely free of charge, and you can download it from the official website of the developer.
- Start CCleaner.
- Go to the section called "Registry".
- Start scanning by clicking on "Search".
- After completing the operation, click on the "Fix" line and confirm your choice.
The program will delete the registry entries that 360 Total Security created. All other garbage accumulated over the entire time the user is working will also be deleted after this procedure.
Revo Uninstaller
The method described above will appeal to people who like to control all the processes running on their PC. To simplify actions, you can use the utility Revo Uninstaller or similar. This product is designed specifically for uninstalling applications, monitoring their activity and cleaning the computer from garbage left after running programs.
How to uninstall 360 Total Security using Revo Uninstaller? Follow these steps:
- download, install and run the utility;
- find the antivirus icon in the window that opens, move the cursor to it;
- unfold context menu by clicking the right mouse button;
- select the "Delete" item;
- in the menu called "Perform initial analysis" select "Advanced mode" and click on the line "Scanning";
- after some time, a window with the found registry keys will appear on the display, put a checkmark in front of all the items written in bold, and click on the "Delete" button, click on the "Next" inscription.
Now the program will show which files the application has left on the system. Click on the "Select All" button and then on "Delete".
360 Total Security is a security product from Chinese developers that sometimes makes it difficult for users to uninstall it. Next, we will consider what 360 Total Security is, how to uninstall it and how to solve possible difficulties that arise during the process.
What is 360 Total Security and the complexity of removal
360 Total Security is a free (freeware) antivirus software that boasts the presence of the Qihoo 360 antivirus itself, as well as built-in modules in the form of a firewall, Avira engine and cloud technology protection, which is rare in free solutions.According to the developers' statement, as well as the opinion of many users, this product is able to compete with many commercial offers, and even more so with others. free antivirus... There are two versions of the program:
- 360 Total Security;
- 360 Total Security Essential.
As practice shows, after making a decision to remove this product (for example, to install other antivirus software), users are faced with the fact that when trying to uninstall, errors occur, and, as a result, the uninstallation procedure is blocked or ends without result. Why is this happening? The fact is that the antivirus has means of protection against being unintentionally deleted by inaccurate users, or so as not to be removed by malware.
Manually uninstalling 360 Total Security
This method can be roughly divided into several main components, which will be discussed below.Initializing the built-in uninstaller
Cleaning from application files
Important! Before proceeding with the deletion of the folder with the anti-virus files, it is imperative to restart the computer - otherwise, an error will occur when you try to delete the folder.
- Go to Windows explorer(you can quickly do this by pressing the combination on the keyboard Windows keys+ E);
- Go to the path "C: Program Files" or "C: Program Files (x86)" (depending on the version and bitness of Windows);
- Place the cursor on the folder with the name "360", press the right mouse button and select the "Delete" option.
In addition to the folder and files of the antivirus itself, after the uninstaller works, unnecessary registry keys remain in the system, which, in theory, can be found and deleted by the built-in tools of the Windows OS (regedit). In practice, some of the keys cannot be manually deleted, and therefore it is better to use a third-party utility, for example, CCleaner. You can download it from the developer's official website for free at the link - https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/standard.
So, let's launch the program and proceed:
- Find the "Registry" section in the menu and select it;
- Launch a registry scan by clicking the "Search for problems" button;
- We delete the found results by clicking the "Fix" button.
Removal using the special utility Revo Uninstaller
The previous method is well suited for people who are used to seeing any important process from the inside and controlling every detail. For an ordinary user, it will be much easier, faster and more efficient to remove 360 Total Security using the specialized utility Revo Uninstaller. It will perform this manipulation not only in less time, but also an order of magnitude better to clean the system from the remnants of the remote program.Removal instructions via the Revo Uninstaller utilities:
After that, the 360 Total Security program and its traces will be completely removed from your computer.
Video tutorial to remove 360 Total Security
In the following video, you can clearly see how to manually remove 360 Total Security from your computer:
Virus software developers are constantly inventing more and more sophisticated ways to infect users' computers for some kind of fraudulent operation. One of these unusual ways is the use of so-called false antiviruses - programs that pretend to be antivirus programs, but in fact, on the contrary, are Trojans that infect the user's computer. It is quite natural that it is impossible to remove such programs using standard tools, so you have to think about how to get rid of them. One of the most common programs of this kind is 360 Safety Guard.
If you encounter problems caused by installing 360 Safety Guard, you should immediately think about how to remove it from the system. First, try using a specialized utility designed to remove such programs, but if it cannot help you, you will have to carry out the entire operation manually.
It is worth noting the fact that quite often during the reinstallation of the anti-virus program of Kaspersky, many users encounter this problem when an error appears stating that " Incompatible antivirus 360SafetyGuard».
What it is?
The 360 Safety Guard itself, as mentioned above, is fake antivirus which is essentially a standard virus or trojan. It penetrates a computer in a fairly standard way - after a user visits some dubious site in order to download free software, he can automatically install such a utility on his computer. It is enough just to forget to uncheck a certain checkbox during the installation process, and third-party software will automatically download to your computer, which will infect it.
Programs such as 360 Safety Guard can simply interfere with working normally with your computer (for example, as mentioned above, they prevent you from installing an antivirus), but in some cases they can seriously harm. In particular, they can supposedly detect all kinds of threats in the operation of your system, but in fact, these "threats" are absolutely fake, and the user can simply delete some important files from his computer on his own. In some cases, even system files, as a result of which the computer becomes completely inoperative.
At the same time, it is worth noting the fact that even such popular today utilities as CCleaner or ADWCleaner can be absolutely powerless in such situations, since they are not configured to counteract fake antivirus programs, but there is always a suitable solution for such problems.
Remove Fake Antivirus
This program is a more modern development in comparison with the above utilities. This software is used precisely in order to rid the computer of any fake antiviruses, so its efficiency is more than high.
The use of this program is relevant not only to remove 360 Safety Guard, but also, if necessary, to rid your computer of a number of other similar programs. It is worth noting the fact that the official website of the program contains a detailed list of the names of such malware, in connection with which it is not difficult to eliminate them.
In principle, the program is extremely easy to install and configure, so even novice users can use it. However, if you do not like this method, or in the process of using the program you still could not cope with the problem, you will have to carry out all the procedures completely manually.
How to manually remove fake antiviruses?
It should be noted that antiviruses of this kind are often executed entirely in Chinese, as a result of which their removal is very difficult for those people who do not understand it. In other words, it is difficult to select exactly the sections you need to delete from the Chinese menu. this program from your computer.
In the overwhelming majority of cases, the following series of actions helps:
- Open the menu Start.
- Choose an item Control Panel.
- Click on Programs and Features.
- In the list of programs, you should see some familiar name with a number 360 or incomprehensible Chinese characters.
- After you have found the utility you need, click on Delete.
- In the new window, click the button Yes, at the same time, it is worth noting the fact that you need to press not on the brightly highlighted button, but on the dim one, which is located on the side.
- After the deletion procedure is completed, click on RestartNow.
If the whole procedure was done correctly, you will completely remove the program from your computer. Just in case, after such removal, run again CCleaner programs and Remove Fake Antivirus, which will check your computer for leftover files and clean up the registry if necessary.