How to remove the "Bing.Zugo" toolbar hijack

Today I discovered that the Bing.Zugotoolbar had hijacked by Internet Explorer browser. Naturally, I want it unintalled, since its really bothering me. It forces me to use their search page, and seems to re-route my browser to other pages when I type in a URL. God knows what kinds of stats they are collecting on me, or if they're monitoring my key strokes.

I first went to my Windows control panel > add/remove programs, but there was no unintall program listed for either Bing or Zugo.

Next I went to Internet Explorer > Tools > Manage Add-ons. Scroll way down to the bottom of the list (probably why they chose a name that begins with a Z) and you will see the Zugo toolbar listed. Click on these items and disable them.

Now, right click on the Windows Start button in the lower left corner of your screen, and choose "Open Windows Explorer." Navigate to:

C:\Program Files\SearchToolbar

In this folder you will find the hidden Zugo uninstall programs. I ran these and they did indeed seem to remove Zugo from my computer, at least the file sin the directory. They did leave behind registry entries that continue to affect browser settings. 

You will have to remove the Zugo keys from your registry with RegEdit, Windows Registry Editor. Be very careful here, since messing up your registry can be bad thing.

In Windows, click Start and type: Regedit

After RegEdit loads, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Zugo

Right click on the ZUGO folder and DELETE

If you have Firefox installed, then you have an extra step to perform.

1. Open FireFox and instead of a url, type: about:config 

2. Firefox will give you a scary warning, but go in anyway. We must be brave.

3. Locate the keyword.url line. It should look like this:

4. Use your mouse to right click on keyword.url, then select Reset

That should do it!

 

While this is certainly a browser hijack, I can't tell if it is malware of any sort, or a virus. Dr. Web reports the threat level of Zugo as "ignore" but that doesn't seem wise to me. I've reported this as Malware to Google and to everyone else I can think of, but the issue doesn't seem to get much attention.

Neither Panda Anti-virus software or Microsoft Security Essentials caught this as of this writing. Caution is order.  Clearly, this is a company that make money when their crap is installed on your computer influencing what you see and where you go. That is always a bad thing.

Beware of Zugo.

If this has helped you, please pay it forward. I suggest making a donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (www.eff.org). They are a non-profit organization that has lawyers and smart people fighting to preserve your internet privacy and freedoms. They are WELL worth your support.  Please at least sign up for their free newsletter so you can learn about important internet privacy issues facing all of us.