The HSA E-mail Thank You Thread

Dexter

As many of you know, Short-Media's Security "SWAT TEAM" has been hard at work fighting a new and very rampant browser hijack known as Home Search Assistant (HSA.) As part of this effort, we wrote a Removal Guide in mid-August, which has climbed to the top of the search engine rankings, is getting thousands of page views per week, and has also generated a fair bit of SVT forum traffic from those needing some extra help from one of our dedicated Security SVT volunteers. Our small but dedicated Security SWAT Team has been very busy the last several weeks helping these users figure out the one or two steps they needed to successfully remove their problems.

The vast majority of the people who are viewing the guide are not registering as users here at SM, as they are successfully fixing their problem without any other assistance, just by following our guide, and perhaps reading some of the forum posts as well.

But some of those users have taken the time to e-mail us their thanks and their praise. Many were frustrated beyond belief with this problem, and could not believe how easily it could actually be fixed with the right instructions. The SM Staff thought it would be nice to share some of these thank-you e-mails publicly, so that the SM "regulars" or any other visitors, could see how grateful these folks were to find a place like Short-Media.com.

E-mails to follow....

Dexter...

Dexter

From "Paul" :

MANY MANY THANKS IT SOLVED MY PROBLEMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HAD DIFFICULTY WITH HOME SEARCH FOR ABOUT A WEEK, TRIED THE REMOVAL GUIDE AND HEY PRESTO ALL GONE.

MAGIC!

WILL LET OTHERS KNOW ABOUT AN EXCELLENT SITE.

PAUL

Dexter

From "Steve" :

After trying for the last week to get rid of Home
Search Assistant, I ran across your guide today. It
took two times through to get everything, but I think
it's finally gone. I tried several other forum
suggestions, and yours is the only one that worked.

Thanks,

Steve

Dexter

From "Bruce" (e-mail humourously titled "You Saved My Arse!") :

Thanks for your steps on removing adware from my machine.

After a whole day trying to do this with other programs the few hours spent
was worth it.


Bruce
Canberra, Australia

Dexter

From "KRK" :

Hi! Your guide for removing Home Search Assistant was GREAT!!!

Thanks, I was struggling with that for over 10 days!

Dexter

From "Tom", one of my favourite e-mails so far:

Just wanted to drop you a line to thank you for the Removal Guide.

I got the dreaded HSA at the end of July. A Google search took me to Short-Media and I read everything and understood (almost) nothing. A program from Web Root controlled the hijacked home page and constantly running the downloads your site recommended pretty much slowed the damage. I switched to my notebook and took the desktop to a company I have used for many years to bail me out of trouble. They found NOTHING! They did tell me all of the spyware was slowing the computer down.

Continued to Google and always ended up at Short-Media. I discovered that what I lacked in self-confidence I made up for in increased ignorance. I was really lost. I read everything I could find, then I found the Removal Guide. After reading it nine or ten times I got up the nerve to give it a try. The first time I tried it, I was not able to remove the problem. What I came away with was the direction to create a "Quarantine" folder. I went into the System32 files and checked all the .exe and .dll files for dates and descriptions and found those with no descriptions had similar dates and sizes. As directed, I changed them to .xxx and .ddd and quarantined them but in normal mode.

I had been running Hijack This, About:Buster and Ad-Aware every day but after the quarantine the Ad-Aware identified 53 files as being CWS in the Quarantine folder. THAT gave me the confidence to try the guide again. This time, however, I did the hard boot on my HP by yanking the cord on the back--something the operating manual says never to do. The safe mode Hijack This showed one bad BHO and a bad search hook. I followed the Removal Guide to the letter. I wish I could tell you it made me rich, regrew my thinning hair and took 20 years off my age of 54 but I can not. It did, however, completely get rid of the Home Search Assistant. My Hijack logs are clean and About:Buster cleaned up a few odds and ends. I checked the add/remove programs and the HSA, SA and SE programs were gone. It has been two weeks so I guess I can breathe again.

I can't thank you enough for the clear and concise directions you set forward in the Removal Guide. Not only were the instructions great but the tone was very non-threatening, perfect for the technologically impaired like myself. Keep up the wonderful work and I hope you know how much your site has helped folks like me.

Tom
Cleveland OH

Dexter

From "Anoymous" :

hi there i have had that terrible hijack search assistant on my pc for months, it got to the point where i was crying in frustration , due to not being able to find where it was hiding, i had no access to the internet, and every time i tried it kept going back to that terrible search page, i have plenty of anti viruses on pc and firewalls etc, but nothing detected it, i put prevx on my pc and all that could do was tell me that search assistant was trying to gain access, but as this darn programme had no such name, it took a fair few trials to work out what programme this was.

Last night i decided i would search to find out what i could about these people who were hijacking my pc, indeeed i was in a very bad mood and was ready to threaten to sue them, then a miracle as i'd call it happened, i accidently came to your site and hey presto i found your downloads, well what can i say? i am absolutely in heaven and am finally smiling after months of misery, its worked wonders i am so very grateful to you for helping me be rid of a plague!