This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Avatar for Username

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

How do you disable MySearch Dial from being the default when opening a new tab?

  • 3 replies
  • 7 have this problem
  • 13 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

sasabune
sasabune
more options

I was able to change it from being the default in the search box at the top of the browser, but whenever I open a new tab the entire tab still defaults to the MySearchDial search page. I think it was somehow installed on my pc via malware and I seem to have gotten rid of it in IE and Chrome but it persists in Firefox. Also I do not see it in the list of Programs in Control Panel so I cannot uninstall it that way (unless it is called something else?).

I was able to change it from being the default in the search box at the top of the browser, but whenever I open a new tab the entire tab still defaults to the MySearchDial search page. I think it was somehow installed on my pc via malware and I seem to have gotten rid of it in IE and Chrome but it persists in Firefox. Also I do not see it in the list of Programs in Control Panel so I cannot uninstall it that way (unless it is called something else?).

Chosen solution

hello, you have various malicious addons present. please try these steps:

  1. reset firefox (this will keep your bookmarks and passwords)
  2. afterwards go to firefox > addons > extensions and in case there are still extensions listed there, disable them.
  3. finally run a full scan of your system with different security tools like the free version of malwarebytes and adwcleaner to make sure that adware isn't present in other places of your system as well.

Troubleshoot Firefox issues caused by malware

Read this answer in context 👍 2

All Replies (3)

philipp
philipp
  • Moderator
more options

Chosen Solution

hello, you have various malicious addons present. please try these steps:

  1. reset firefox (this will keep your bookmarks and passwords)
  2. afterwards go to firefox > addons > extensions and in case there are still extensions listed there, disable them.
  3. finally run a full scan of your system with different security tools like the free version of malwarebytes and adwcleaner to make sure that adware isn't present in other places of your system as well.

Troubleshoot Firefox issues caused by malware

sasabune
sasabune Question owner
more options

Thank you, in process of running a McAfee scan on cookies, I think before I ran it on local drives..

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

Note that your System Details List shows two MySearchDial extensions:

  1. MySearchDial NewTab 9.5.3 ({ad9a41d2-9a49-4fa6-a79e-71a0785364c8})
  2. mysearchdial.com 1.6.0 (ffxtlbr@mysearchdial.com)

Your System Details List shows that you have a user.js file in the profile folder to initialize prefs each time Firefox starts.

The user.js file is only present if you or other software has created this file and normally it wouldn't be there. You can check its content with a plain text editor (right-click: Open with) if you didn't create this file yourself.

The user.js file is read each time Firefox is started and initializes preferences to the value specified in this file, so preferences set via user.js can only be changed temporarily for the current session.

Extensions that do not have a "Remove" button are installed by other software and are not under control of the Firefox extension manager.
Such globally installed extensions are usually found via a registry scan or are installed in a location that Firefox scans for installed extensions.

Extensions installed this way need to be removed via the settings (options/preferences) of the program that has added this extension or this program has to be uninstalled via "Control Panel > Programs".
In Firefox you an only disable such an extension.