http://www.pchell.com/support/smartsearch.shtmlWhat is Smartsearch.ws?
Smartsearch.ws is a website search engine with lots of search results for things like debt consolidation, refinancing, casinos, and more related searches generally seen in spam emails. Most searches appear to be affiliate links that make the owner of the site money through clickthroughs. It has a "search the web" option that doesnt appear to care what you type in the box, it simply shows another page of results from keywords that the site has in a database. It takes over as your start page and appears to be a variant of the CoolWebSearch homepage hijacker as well.
How do I Remove Smartsearch.ws?
Since Smartsearch.ws appears to be a variant of CoolWebSearch, the easiest way to regain control of your system would be to download and run a program called CWShredder, created by Merijn of Spywareinfo.com. Merijn has an entire page devoted to CoolWebSearch and its many variants.
You can download CWShredder by clicking on this link.
Then
Go to
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/to download the FireFox browser