How to uninstall OriginType app/extension from Mac (Virus removal guide)

What is OriginType

OriginType is a malicious applcation that belongs to the Adware family. Adware is a form of malicious software that is designed for the purpose of showing various pop-up windows and/or unwanted advertisements on the infected machine without the user’s consent. These ads should be ignored as they can redirect the web browser to harmful and scam webpages. Adware software usually gets installed alongside free applications, codecs and shareware.

Does adware steal your privacy information? The OriginType adware can collect a wide variety of marketing-type data about you to get profit. It can analyze your browsing, and gain access to your personal data and, subsequently, can transfer it third party companies. Thus, there are more than enough reasons to get rid of adware software from your computer.

If you are unfortunate have adware software or malware running on your computer, you can follow the suggestions here to get rid of OriginType from your Apple Mac and web-browser.

How does OriginType get on your machine

The adware was probably installed on your computer when you installed certain free software such as Email checker, PDF creator, video codec, etc. Because more often than not, adware software can be bundled with the installation files of Softonic, Cnet, Soft32, Brothersoft or other similar software download web-pages. Thus, you must be very careful when running any files downloaded from the World Wide Web! Always read the User Agreement, Software License and Terms of Use carefully. In the installation wizard, you should select the Advanced, Custom or Manual installation option to specify which components and bundled applications to install, otherwise you risk infecting your Apple Mac with adware or a PUP (potentially unwanted program).

Threat Summary

Name	OriginType, OriginType 1.0 app
Type	adware, potentially unwanted program (PUP), Mac virus, Mac malware
Detection Names	Adware.MAC.Generic, OSX.Trojan.Gen, Trojan-Downloader.OSX.Adload, MacOS.Agent-MT, Program:MacOS/Vigram.A, ApplicUnwnt, Adware/Adload!OSX and Osx.Adware.Cimpli
Distribution	Freeware installers, torrent downloads, dubious pop-up advertisements and fake software updaters
Symptoms	The website links redirect to a web-sites different from what you expected, unclosable window appear and recommend fake updates and other unwanted software, your Apple Mac starts automatically installing unexpected software, an unwanted toolbar appears in your web browser, your web browser home page has changed and you cannot modify it back, slow Internet browsing speeds.
Removal	OriginType removal guide

How to remove OriginType from Mac

Adware is a form of malicious software that you might have difficulty in removing it from your machine. Luckily, you have found the effective OriginType adware removal guidance in this article. Both the manual removal way and the automatic removal solution will be provided below and you can just select the one that best for you. If you have any questions or need help then type a comment below. Read this manual carefully, bookmark it or open this page on your smartphone, because you may need to close your internet browser or reboot your Apple Mac.

To remove OriginType, use the steps below:

1. Remove profiles created by OriginType
2. Check the list of installed software
3. Remove OriginType related files and folders
4. Scan your Mac with MalwareBytes
5. Remove OriginType from Safari, Chrome, Firefox
6. How to stay safe online

Remove profiles created by OriginType

OriginType can install a configuration profile on the Mac system to block changes made to the browser settings. Therefore, you need to open system preferences, find and delete the profile installed by the adware.

Click the System Preferences icon ( ) in the Dock, or choose Apple menu ( ) > System Preferences.

In System Preferences, click Profiles, then select a profile associated with OriginType.

Click the minus button ( – ) located at the bottom-left of the Profiles screen to remove the profile.
Note: if you do not see Profiles in the System Preferences, that means there are no profiles installed on your Mac, which is normal.

Check the list of installed software

Check the list of installed applications on your Mac and delete all unknown and recently installed software. If you see an unknown application with incorrect spelling or varying capital letters, it have most likely been installed by malicious software and you should clean it off first with malicious software removal utility like MalwareBytes.

1. Open the Finder.
2. Click “Applications”.
3. It will display a list of all applications installed on the computer.
4. Scroll through the all list, and uninstall dubious and unknown apps. Pay maximum attention to the program you installed last.
5. Drag the questionable program from the Applications folder to the Trash.
6. Empty Trash.

Remove OriginType related files and folders

Now you need to try to find OriginType related files and folders, and then delete them manually. You need to look for these files in certain directories. To quickly open them, we recommend using the “Go to Folder…” command.

OriginType creates several files, these files must be found and removed. Below is a list of files associated with this unwanted program.

• /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.OriginType.system.plist
• ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.OriginType.service.plist
• /Library/Application Support/.(RANDOM)/System/com.OriginType.system
• ~/Library/Application Support/.(RANDOM)/Services/com.OriginType.service.app

Some files created by OriginType are hidden from the user. To find and delete them, you need to enable “show hidden files”. To do this, use the shortcut CMD + SHIFT + . Press once to show hidden files and again to hide them. There is another way. Click Finder -> Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal. In Terminal, paste the following text: defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

Press Enter. Hold the ‘Option/alt’ key, then right click on the Finder icon in the dock and click Relaunch.

Click on the Finder icon. From the menu bar, select Go and click “Go to Folder…”. As a result, a small window opens that allows you to quickly open a specific directory.

Check for OriginType generated files in the /Library/LaunchAgents folder

In the “Go to Folder…” window, type the following text and press Go:
/Library/LaunchAgents

This will open the contents of the “/Library/LaunchAgents” folder. Look carefully at it and pay special attention to recently created files, as well as files that have a suspicious name. Move all suspicious files to the Trash. A few examples of files: com.net-preferences.plist, com.OriginType.service.plist, installapp.plist, macsearch.plist, com.google.defaultsearch.plist, , search.plist and com.machelper.plist. Most often, browser hijackers, PUPs and adware create several files with similar names.

Check for OriginType generated files in the /Library/Application Support folder

In the “Go to Folder…” window, type the following text and press Go:
/Library/Application Support

This will open the contents of the “Application Support” folder. Look carefully at its contents, pay special attention to recently added/changed folders and files. Check the contents of suspicious folders, if there is a file with a name similar to com.OriginType.system, then this folder must be deleted. Move all suspicious folders and files to the Trash.

Check for OriginType generated files in the “~/Library/LaunchAgents” folder

In the “Go to Folder…” window, type the following text and press Go:
~/Library/LaunchAgents

Proceed in the same way as with the “/Library/LaunchAgents” and “/Library/Application Support” folders. Look for suspicious and recently added files. Move all suspicious files to the Trash.

Check for OriginType generated files in the /Library/LaunchDaemons folder

In the “Go to Folder…” window, type the following text and press Go:
/Library/LaunchDaemons

Carefully browse the entire list of files and pay special attention to recently created files, as well as files that have a suspicious name. Move all suspicious files to the Trash. A few examples of files to be deleted: com.machelper.system.plist, com.macsearch.system.plist, com.installapp.system.plist, com.OriginType.system.plist and com.search.system.plist. In most cases, adware, browser hijackers and potentially unwanted programs create several files with similar names.

Scan your Mac with MalwareBytes

If you carefully followed the previous steps, then you should be able to remove OriginType. Of course, very often adware, browser hijackers and potentially unwanted programs hides on a Mac, disguising itself as legitimate apps and files. Therefore, in some cases, it is difficult for an inexperienced user to decide whether a particular file is part of potentially unwanted programs, adware and browser hijackers. Therefore, we advise you to run MalwareBytes Free to scan the Mac computer.

Click the link below to download MalwareBytes.

When downloading is finished, close all apps and windows on your MAC OS. Run the saved file. Follow the prompts.

The MalwareBytes will automatically start and you can see its main screen as displayed below.

Now click the “Scan” button to perform a system scan for the OriginType adware software. A system scan can take anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes, depending on your computer. While the MalwareBytes Anti-Malware (MBAM) tool is scanning, you can see count of objects it has identified as being infected by malware.

After finished, it will show the Scan Results. Make sure to check mark the items that are unsafe and then click the “Quarantine” button. The MalwareBytes AntiMalware (MBAM) will get rid of OriginType and move the selected items to the Quarantine.

Remove OriginType from Safari, Chrome, Firefox

If you are still seeing OriginType adware that won’t go away, you might have malicious plugins installed on your web browser. Check your browser for unwanted extensions using the steps below.

Google Chrome	Mozilla Firefox
In the top right corner, click on Chrome’s main menu button, represented by three vertical dots. Select ‘More tools’, then ‘Extensions’. Click ‘Remove’ to uninstall an extension. Click ‘Remove’ in the dialog box. You can also try to remove OriginType by reset Google Chrome settings.	Click on ‘menu’ button and select ‘Add-ons’. Go to ‘Extensions’ tab. To uninstall an add-on, click on ‘Remove’ button next to it. If you are still experiencing problems with OriginType removal, you need to reset Mozilla Firefox browser.
Safari
On the top menu select ‘Safari’, then ‘Preferences’. Select ‘Extensions’ tab. Select an extension you want to delete and click ‘Uninstall’ button next to it.

How to stay safe online

Use an ad-blocking tool like AdGuard will protect you from malicious ads and content. Moreover, you can find that the AdGuard have an option to protect your privacy and block phishing and spam web sites. Additionally, ad blocker applications will help you to avoid unwanted pop ups and unverified links that also a good way to stay safe online.

Download AdGuard on your Apple Mac from the following link.

Once the downloading process is done, run the downloaded file. The “Setup Wizard” window will show up on the computer screen.

Follow the prompts. AdGuard will then be installed. A window will show up asking you to confirm that you want to see a quick guide. Click “Skip” button to close the window and use the default settings, or click “Get Started” to see an quick guidance that will help you get to know AdGuard better.

Each time, when you start your computer, AdGuard will start automatically and stop annoying pop-up advertisements, block harmful and misleading web sites.

Finish words

Now your MAC system should be clean of the OriginType adware. We suggest that you keep AdGuard (to help you stop unwanted popups and annoying malicious web sites) and MalwareBytes Anti-Malware (MBAM) (to periodically scan your MAC system for new adwares and other malware).

If you are still having problems while trying to remove OriginType from the Chrome, Firefox and Safari, then ask for help here here.