Now News Online

Now News Online entices users with promises of a convenient way to see "Today's Breaking News." However, installing the Now News Online could lead to some unpleasant surprises as the application is a little more than another browser hijacker. Once installed on the computer, the Now News Online will take over the default browser and modify its settings. The default search engine will be changed to search.hnownewsonline.com. The homepage and new page tab also will be set to redirect to search.hnownewsonline.com.

As is usually the case, the search engine promoted by Now News Online is fake - it cannot generate search results on its own. Instead, it takes the user's search query and redirects it through a legitimate search engine - search.yahoo.com.

Users can come across Now News Online either as a browser extension or as a stand-alone browser based on the Chromium project. The goal and behavior of both versions are the same, but it can take the users a bit of time to realize that their default Chrome browser has been substituted with something else, due to the nearly identical design.