How to Remove the Ad.Yield.Manager Tracking Cookie

It ran slow. Pages refused to load. Yahoo Mail stopped working. Pop-up ads appeared. I kept getting dumped on the Google home page, where I learned my search for "ad.yieldmanager.com" produced no results.

I added this URL to my blocked sites. It re-appeared.

Sometimes, a click on old reliable links, like the Upload link on E-Bay's Create Listing form, took me instead to the Google search results for ad.yieldmanager.com.

While I was on the Google home page, I copied the adyieldmanager URL into the Search field. On tech forums, I learned that ad.yieldmanager.com is spyware; a tracking cookie that allows spammers to monitor a user's browsing habits and collect personal information.

The creators of free software sometimes piggyback spyware on their programs as a way of recovering development expenses. Adult web sites and P2P file sharing sites are other places where spyware such as adyieldmanager can be unknowingly downloaded.

I remember how and where I picked mine up: by clicking on a link on one of those scam web sites that promises freelancers the secrets of earning a six-figure income from writing.

The ad.yieldmanager.com tracking cookie is one that eludes many malware removal programs. AdAware and Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, that always find everything, didn't find it.

Several posters on the tech forums suggested HijackThis, a free malware remover they had used with successful results.

I downloaded HijackThis. On Vista, to perform a full system scan, the user must right-click the program icon and select Run As Administrator from the menu.

Per the instructions on the forums, I looked for this line in the system scan log:

O2 - BHO: Browser Address Error Redirector - {CA6319C0-31B7-401E-A518-A07C3DB8F777} - c:\windows\system32\BAE.dll

I checked the box next to this line.

HijackThis allows the user to read details of selected items. In the log, O2 group items are designated as BHO, or Browser Helper Objects.

Some BHOs enable a browser to do more things everywhere on the Internet. Others, such as toolbars specific to certain websites, whose only purpose is to help the user navigate those sites, may contain spyware.

If the details for any item in the O2 group indicated it was a duplicate of something already in the registry, I checked it as well. I then deleted all the checked items.

I shut my computer down down, and re-booted. Everything was fine, without any of the O2 group (BHO) items. I was a writer again.

Before using any spyware removal program, back up important documents, and be careful what you delete. If you know your computer well, you'll know what it needs and doesn't need to operate the way it should.

Novices would be safe by deleting only the Browser Address Error Redirector suggested on the forums. If ad.yieldmanager persists, delete the other BHO items one at a time. When your browser was new, it didn't need any helper objects, did it?