I wrote this article to help you remove Hi.fo Virus. This Hi.fo Virus removal guide works for Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer.

The Hi.fo program belongs to the family of browser hijackers. If the search.hi.fo website appears all the time when you browse the web, you are infected. The hijacker is already on your machine, it has managed to slither in and you didn’t even notice. That’s how hijackers work. They enter in complete silence and then proceed to wreck your system.

How did the pest enter? You are not going to like the answer but it tricked you. As it is still a program, even though a malicious one, the hijacker needs to be properly installed. In other words, it needs your permission. If you don’t give it, it cannot enter. No permission, no admission. Sounds pretty straightforward but it is not.

Infections have found ways around this rule. They still follow it, but they also bend it a little. How? Well, the parasite still asks for approval but it does so in the sneakiest ways possible. You are not aware of what you are agreeing to. The infection relies on tricky tactics to get your okay. For instance, it hides behind corrupted links and pages, hitches a ride with spam messages or freeware bundles, pretends to be a program update, etc. The thing is that if you are not careful, it will succeed in tricking you. But if you pay more attention you can catch it in the act and prevent it from entering. So, be more vigilant. Hijackers make for horrible tenants. Let`s get into details.

Once the pest settles, problems start pouring. Your entire browsing experience changes significantly. To be more accurate, it becomes a nightmare. The hijacker makes changes in your browsers` settings without bothering to ask you. It doesn’t need to. It makes modifications as it sees fit. For example, the search.hi.fo site is now in the places of your previous homepage and search engine. Did you agree to that switch? No. And yet, here it is. This malicious site is everywhere, all of a sudden. And it is not alone. You are forced to visit many others just as shady pages as well. You cannot find what you are looking for online as you are constantly redirected. And don’t forget about the ads. The hijacker also appends a pesky extension to your browsers thus injecting them with ads.

So, aside from the redirects, you are also bombarded with countless commercials in all shapes and forms. All of this makes surfing the web impossible. And also dangerous. Nothing you see because of Hi.fo is reliable. One wrong click and you may download more parasites on your PC, which by the way, is already underperforming. Due to the infection, your machine`s speed slows down to a crawl. It also crashes and reboots frequently. Programs take ages to load. Your browsers freeze because of the ad avalanche. Your Internet speed and connection may worsen as well. But somehow there is something even worse than those things.

The hijacker puts your privacy in jeopardy. The pest starts spying on you from the moment it enters. It monitors everything you do online. It has access to your IPs, email addresses, usernames, passwords, accounts, browser-related information, etc. If you are particularly unlucky, it may even get its hands on your personally identifiable and financial information.

Keep in mind that everything the hijacker gathers gets send to the individuals behind it. These strangers can use your data for whatever they want. Or, they can sell it to third parties. There will be many potential buyers, believe us. Either way, you lose. Crooks are the last people to have access to your personal information. Don’t let them. Use our removal guide below and get rid of the nasty parasite immediately. The sooner it is gone, the better.

Hi.fo Virus Uninstall

Before starting the real removal process, you must reboot in Safe Mode. If you are familiar with this task, skip the instructions below and proceed to Step 2. If you do not know how to do it, here is how to reboot in Safe mode:

For Windows 98, XP, Millenium and 7:
Reboot your computer. When the first screen of information appears, start repeatedly pressing F8 key. Then choose Safe Mode With Networking from the options.

For Windows 8/8.1
Click the Start button, next click Control Panel —> System and Security —> Administrative Tools —> System Configuration.‌

Check the Safe Boot option and click OK. Click Restart when asked.
For Windows 10
Open the Start menu and click or tap on the Power button.

While keeping the Shift key pressed, click or tap on Restart.

Here are the steps you must perform to remove the hijacker from the browser:

Remove From Mozilla Firefox:

Open Firefox, click on top-right corner , click Add-ons, hit Extensions next.

Look for suspicious or unknown extensions, remove them all.

Remove From Chrome:

Open Chrome, click chrome menu icon at the top-right corner —>More Tools —> Extensions. There, identify the malware and select chrome-trash-icon(Remove).

Remove From Internet Explorer:
Open IE, then click IE gear icon on the top-right corner —> Manage Add-ons.

Find the malicious add-on. Remove it by pressing Disable.

Right click on the browser’s shortcut, then click Properties. Remove everything after the .exe” in the Target box.

Open Control Panel by holding the Win Key and R together. Write appwiz.cpl in the field, then click OK.

Here, find any program you had no intention to install and uninstall it.

Run the Task Manager by right clicking on the Taskbar and choosing Start Task Manager.

Look carefully at the file names and descriptions of the running processes. If you find any suspicious one, search on Google for its name, or contact me directly to identify it. If you find a malware process, right-click on it and choose End task.

Open MS Config by holding the Win Key and R together. Type msconfig and hit Enter.

Go in the Startup tab and Uncheck entries that have “Unknown” as Manufacturer.

Still can not remove Hi.fo Virus from your browser? Please, leave a comment below, describing what steps you performed. I will answer promptly.