Clicking on the RookiNews ad can trigger the injection of various malware or unwanted programs. In this guide, you will see the manual of RookiNews popups removal in various ways, as well as examining your system for other viruses presence.

What are RookiNews pop-ups?

RookiNews popups are an outcome of adware action. Adware is a kind of malware that presents you the pay-per-view of pay-per-click ads, which produces a major volume of revenue for adware representatives. These ads might have sometimes shocking composition, or have a web link to harmful content/website, because adware maintainers have no reason to examine the goodness of the content they are going to reveal – their solitary target is money.

RookiNews push notification.

Pop-up advertising itself is an excellent, affordable and very effective marketing method¹. It permits the seller to link the buyers’ attention to their website, as well as the customers to get the dynamic updates on the goods they wish to buy. When the consumer will get a pop-up notification that the TV set he desires to purchase is provided at the online shop he/she visited previously with a 15% price cut, one will definitely use this chance and buy it. Taking into consideration the incredibly small cost for the popups and their targeting, such an advertising and marketing instrument is a favourite thing amongst the advertising teams of big online stores.

However, such a profitable plan could not be missed by virus developers. Potential to demonstrate the popup advertisements forcibly to the victims of malware invasion is an ideal basis for malicious adjustments with the popup promotions. And Rookinews.com ads is among hundreds that are “employed” in this scheme.

Site	Rookinews.com
Hosting	AS16509 Amazon.com, Inc. Netherlands, Amsterdam
Infection Type	Adware, Push notifications, Unwanted Ads, Pop-up Ads
IP Address	52.222.139.126
Symptoms	Annoying pop-up ads in the right corner.
Similar behavior	Boffero, Amnivity, Riderfabric
Fix Tool	GridinSoft Anti-MalwareTo remove possible virus infections, try to scan your PC

How have I got the RookiNews virus?

There are a huge amount of ways of getting infected by the adware that trigger the RookiNews popups tornado. A lion’s part of this computer virus cases is after the freeware or cracked programs, that are spread on the peering networks. Free software can likewise be downloaded from the main site, and the adware is provided as a legal bundled program.

There is no need to blame yourself. A lot of users oftentimes use the dubious programs from untrusted sources: abandonware, various apps that are free, and even hacked programs. All of these kinds of applications are dangerous, due to the fact that it is extremely simple to integrate a RookiNews malware under the cover of part of the license hacking script, or as a part of the self-made algoritm inside of the Windows optimization tool.

RookiNews popup malware may also be hidden in the promotion somewhere on the odd site. Such websites are generally full of bright and blinking advertisements, and their proprietors often approve any promotions to be placed on their web page. Therefore, clicking such banners is a risky thing: only the advertisement provider knows what will occur when you click this ad. Besides some “light” viruses, like adware or undesirable programs, you can additionally get something much more dangerous, like ransomware or coin miner; the substantial share of coin miners distribution is exactly after the malicious ads.

The statistic shows that people dislike popup advertising more than other types of promotions

Potentially unwanted applications, like RookiNews popup virus may cause a wide range of different troubles on your computer. Distracting is not the single problem – pop-ups can display you the banners, where you are offered to get one more strange program, or “a amazing security tool”. Scareware is usually spread with the last motto. Potentially unwanted programs, in turn, can have spyware functions. And it is very hard to distinguish the undesirable app from a good one, if you don’t know the exact names. Besides the PUPs and fake antiviruses, popup-related banners are also chosen as a distribution method by various trojan viruses, for example – coin miners. The consequences of actions of such viruses is 100% unwanted, and can cost you hundreds or even thousands of dollars. And even if you are not tapping these banners, they can be clicked by whoever who also uses your PC – parents, children, spouse, etc. So the situation can become much more serious, and it will be much harder to deal with it without data and money loss. It is recommended to remove the viruses with antivirus programs as soon as possible.

How can I get rid of RookiNews pop-up advertisements?

The guide of RookiNews adware clearing consists of 2 sections. First, we need to get rid of the malware, and after that repair the consequences of its action. The elimination task is pretty easy, because it can be executed even with making use of Microsoft Defender – anti-malware program that is available on all personal computers with Windows 8/10. Nevertheless, because of its substantial resources consumption, along with some problems that may be serious for some kinds of users, Defender is often turned off by the users, so its utilization is likely impossible. What’s more, a variety of trojan viruses are capable to turn off the embedded antivirus. It is much better to make use of the separated program that will not have such weakness.

I’d advise you to utilize Gridinsoft Anti-Malware² – a well-proven antivirus device that will certainly remove the viruses from your computer and create an impenetrable cover with a Proactive protection feature. However, let’s take care of RookiNews adware first.

Download GridinSoft Anti-Malware

Removing RookiNews popup virus with GridinSoft Anti-Malware

• Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware. After the installation, you will be offered to perform the Standard Scan. Approve this action.
• Standard scan checks the logical disk where the system files are stored, together with the files of programs you have already installed. The scan lasts up to 6 minutes.
• When the scan is over, you may choose the action for each detected virus. For all files of RookiNews malware the default option is “Delete”. Press “Apply” to finish the malware removal.

Now, when the computer is clean of viruses, we can proceed to the browser reset. You can do this step manually, as well as with the use of GridinSoft Anti-Malware.

Reset browser settings to default

Manual method of browser reset

1. Open “Settings and more” tab in upper right corner, then find here “Settings” button. In the appeared menu, choose “Reset settings” option :
2. After picking the Reset Settings option, you will see the following menu, stating about the settings which will be reverted to original :

1. Open Menu tab (three strips in upper right corner) and click the “Help” button. In the appeared menu choose “troubleshooting information” :
2. In the next screen, find the “Refresh Firefox” option :

After choosing this option, you will see the next message :

1. Open Settings tab, find the “Advanced” button. In the extended tab choose the “Reset and clean up” button :
2. In the appeared list, click on the “Restore settings to their original defaults” :
3. Finally, you will see the window, where you can see all the settings which will be reset to default :

1. Open Settings menu by pressing the gear icon in the toolbar (left side of the browser window), then click “Advanced” option, and choose “Browser” button in the drop-down list. Scroll down, to the bottom of the settings menu. Find there “Restore settings to their original defaults” option :


2. After clicking the “Restore settings…” button, you will see the window, where all settings, which will be reset, are shown :

When the browsers are reset, you need to make sure that your web browser will be connected the proper DNS while connecting to the site you need. Make a text file named “hosts” on your computer’s desktop, then open it and fill it with the following content³:

# Copyright (c) 1993-2006 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a ‘#’ symbol.
#
# For example:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server
# 38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host
# localhost name resolution is handle within DNS itself.
# 127.0.0.1 localhost
# ::1 localhost

Find the hosts.txt file in C:/Windows/System32/drivers/etc directory. Rename this file to “hosts.old.txt” (to distinguish it from the new one), and then move the file you created on the desktop to this folder. Remove the hosts.old from this folder. Now you have your hosts file as good as new.

However, there is one issue that makes things a lot harder to repair, specifically without the anti-malware software. A lot of adware variations that are used to show you the RookiNews pop-up advertisements are adjusting the deep browser settings, disabling an access to the settings tab. So, if you attempt to fix your browser settings after your computer was penetrated by pop-up-related malware, your browser will certainly collapse soon. In certain cases, you will see no crash, however, huge lag spike after pressing the “settings” key. Browser will stop responding for ~ 30 seconds, and afterwards it will be back to the normal, till you try to open settings once again.

Reset your browser settings with GridinSoft Anti-Malware

To reset your browser with GridinSoft Anti-Malware, open the Tools tab, and click the “Reset browser settings” button.

You can see the list of the options for each browser. By default, they are set up in the manner which fits the majority of users. Press the “Reset” button (lower right corner). In a minute your browser will be as good as new.

The browser reset is recommended to perform through the antivirus tool by GridinSoft, because last is also able to reset the HOSTS file without any additional commands.

References

1. More about pop-up advertisements on Wikipedia.
2. GridinSoft Anti-Malware overview and the reasons why I advise it for malware removal.
3. Official Microsoft guide for hosts file reset.