PasswordAssistant

PasswordAssistant is a PUP, or Potentially Unwanted Program, which often is mistakenly referred to as a virus or malware infection. PasswordAssistant may be responsible for the appearance of pop-up and in-text advertisements on popular Web browsers on the Windows operating system such as Google Chrome, Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. The main purpose of PasswordAssistant is to make money by leading computer users to sponsored websites, displaying advertisements and gathering data about computer users' browsing habits. Although PasswordAssistant is not a virus or malware infection, many of its symptoms are commonly associated with more unsafe components such as rootkits or Trojans. PasswordAssistant has browser hijacking capabilities and may seriously disrupt a computer users' activities. Fortunately, PasswordAssistant is much easier to remove and less destructive than most virus infections.

The Numerous Kinds of Advertisement Displayed by PasswordAssistant

PasswordAssistant is commonly referred to as adware because its main purpose is to expose computer users to as many advertisements as possible. There are several types of advertisements commonly linked to PasswordAssistant. These include in-text advertisements that take the form of highlighted text that displays pop-up windows when the mouse passes over it, pop-up windows containing intrusive video advertisements, sponsored affiliate marketing links, special discount or coupon offers or banners or sliding advertisements added to websites that would normally not contain this type of content. Most of the time, PasswordAssistant is bundled with low quality freeware. Although the option to avoid installing PasswordAssistant is usually included, computer users may overlook it. Because of this, a good way of preventing a PasswordAssistant infection is to use custom installation when installing any new software, allowing computer users to monitor exactly what is being installed along with their freeware program.

Stopping the Unwanted Advertisements Associated with PasswordAssistant

To stop PasswordAssistant advertisements, it is necessary to remove this PUP infection from the affected computer. PasswordAssistant may be uninstalled using Windows or the affected Web browser's extension manager. However, PasswordAssistant may be bundled with other PUPs or leave behind traces of this unwanted component. Because of this, it is crucial to use a reliable, fully updated anti-malware program to scan the affected computer after PasswordAssistant has been uninstalled.