Swisscows hijacked my address bar

lisating

I always use my url/address bar to type searches. I had typed one search already this morning, no problem - but it was likely the direct .com site that I go to every morning, not really searching.

Later I needed to actually search there. I typed in what I was looking for. Usually I have the search engine send me through duckduck go, or ecosia, and sometimes Swisscows, which was not my default recently.

Usually your search will bring up results in the subsequent search engine to click. This time, swisscows redirects any search to their web page, telling you to download their bar.

I've set everything to duckduck go. I reset the entire search engine settings, checked my home page settings and everything. I'm STILL getting directed to that Swisscows page to download their bar. It's hijacked.

Edit: whoa - I just used the secondary duckduckgo search bar I have specifically when I want to search ddg. It took me to the swisscows page. mad

How can I fix this?

Pathduck

@lisating Hi -
you've either:

Installed the Swisscows extension yourself and allowed it to control your searches.
- Check Settings > Search
- Check Tools menu > Extensions
Installed some software on your system that came bundled with a "browser hijacker" that installed the extension itself.
- Uninstall any software related to Swisscows including any "helpers" or "toolbars".
Got infected by malware.
- Do a malware scan

Vivaldi does not override your search engine and Swisscows is not a search partner of Vivaldi.

Please make a screenshot showing your Search settings.

I just used the secondary duckduckgo search bar

I have no idea what this is. Do you mean the Start Page search field? The address bar search field?
Make a screenshot.

lisating

Hi thanks for your response.

I had already checked all those things, but I did it all all over again. My default somehow got unchecked (I did not touch it) and even though I reset it to defaults it was still going to swisscow's web page. I don't mind using swisscow to bring up search results, but it was taking over the results in my url and redirecting me to its own page, without providing any results.

I had to force my search engine (I put DuckDuckGo) at the bottom. It was set to private, and now I have also clicked for it as default. So that seemed to resolve my issue.

Thanks for making me look again