Gem Grab is a malware that is also classified as a PUP (Potentially Unwanted Program). If you’re being affected by a Gem Grab infection is a clear consequence of your lack of attention while installing a new software on your computer.
Gem Grab’s goal is quite simple: to show as many ads as possible while you’re browsing the internet. Believe us when we say it won’t go beating around the bush to accomplish this goal, it directly modifies the source code of every website you visit to insert its ads, specially those of e-commerce. As if this wasn’t enough, Gem Grab will also act as a spy, collecting data about your online moves.
These ads can be seen in pop-ups, banners, fake results in Google or as underlined links among the text of every website you visit. Usually these ads are tagged as Gem Grab Ads or Ads by Gem Grab, it’s when this tags are seen that most people realize they have been infected by a malicious software.
Besides ruining your online experience, Gem Grab will also collect data about your browsing habits, saving information about the websites you visit and the searches you make. It goes as far as checking the contents of your computer, supposedly with “statistic purposes”, they even say so in their website. Of course that’s only a lie, the real reason behind it, is to build databases with your data they can sell afterwards.
To avoid this kind of problem in the future, make sure to understand and check the meaning of any pre-selected cases among the install process you run on your computer. Don’t go mindlessly clicking on “Next” before you know for sure what you’re doing, and make sure to always use the advanced options of the install process so you can stop any install you do not wish.
Gem Grab is already known to several antivirus solutions, because it is nothing but a new version of the infection called BrowseFox. SuperWeb LLC, the company responsible for these infections keeps using the same techniques, they only come up with a new name for their program and build a new website to publish their conditions of use.
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