My Safari Search is Stuck on Yahoo

Try running AdwareMedic: http://adwaremedic.com/index.php.

Go to Safari > Preferences > Extensions. Please list them here.

There is no need to download anything to solve this problem.

From the Safari menu bar, select

Safari ▹ Preferences... ▹ Extensions

Turn all extensions OFF and test. If the problem is resolved, turn extensions back ON and then disable them one or a few at a time until you find the culprit.

aspaluba wrote:

I ran AdwareMedic and it removed a bunch of adware but sadly my search is still switching to Yahoo.

You probably just need to change your browser's home page and search engine settings. AdwareMedic does not do that for you. See:

http://www.adwaremedic.com/kb/browsersettings.php

(Fair disclosure: I may receive compensation from links to my sites, TheSafeMac.com and AdwareMedic.com, in the form of buttons allowing for donations. Donations are not required to use my site or software.)

I had the same issue, found a way to solve it after wresting with all kinds of search terms.

Safari search engine stuck on Yahoo, even though I repeatedly tried to change it to Google in Safari Preferences. I found out it was a bad extension called "searchtab 1.0." People are saying you can delete it by downloading yet another app call "AdwareMedic," but I hesitate to fight fire with fire.

My solution:

1. Safari > Preferences > Extensions: Uninstall Searchtab 1.0

2. Safari > Preferences > Search: Double check it's set to Google

More on this topic here: Yahoo has taken over my Safari

frankensheid wrote:

I found out it was a bad extension called "searchtab 1.0." People are saying you can delete it by downloading yet another app call "AdwareMedic," but I hesitate to fight fire with fire.

AdwareMedic would not help with that anyway, as I'm not aware of a "searchtab" browser extension as being adware. (I'm the developer of AdwareMedic.) Do you have any idea what you might have downloaded that included that extension? If not, I'm assuming you have already deleted the extension... but is there any chance you could restore a copy from Time Machine backups and send me a copy?

Didn't mean to offend. I only meant that I wanted to find a native "Yosemite" solution to the problem. I just did a clean install on this machine. No new fonts, very few applications. FileZilla FTP access app was most likely the guilty party.

frankensheid wrote:

Didn't mean to offend.

No offense taken! It's completely reasonable that you're nervous about installing some unknown app to fix a problem caused by installing some other unknown app. That's one of the reasons I also maintain a set of manual removal instructions (which also don't contain any instructions for "searchtab").

FileZilla FTP access app was most likely the guilty party.

Okay, I'll check that out. Thanks for the pointer. In the meantime, if you think of anything else that might help me track down a copy of "searchtab," please let me know.

frankensheid wrote:

FileZilla FTP access app was most likely the guilty party.

You were absolutely right. The FileZilla installer on Sourceforge installed "searchtab" in Safari and an incomplete installation of a highly-obfuscated Firefox extension called "Set Search Settings". (The latter was not actually active on my test system.) I've added both to the AdwareMedic signatures. Thanks for the pointer!

Thanks a lot! I was going nuts over this... It fixed it in a heartbeat! 🙂

Thanks,

FileZilla had installed the extension that keep over writing the selected search engine, I removed the extension and now back to normal,

Wish these companies would stop making changes, If I wanted Yahoo I would have selected it 😠

OMG WORKED THANK YOU!!!

Looks like you got lots of unhelpful advice. I had the same problem and went to Safari -> Preferences -> Search

You will see that Yahoo has become your pref for search engines. Just change it to Google or whatever in the drop down menu.

Solar-Mpls wrote:

Looks like you got lots of unhelpful advice. I had the same problem and went to Safari -> Preferences -> Search

You will see that Yahoo has become your pref for search engines. Just change it to Google or whatever in the drop down menu.

If that's all that was necessary for you, that's great. That may mean you don't have any adware installed. However, for many people having this problem, that by itself won't fix it, and they need to explore options for removing the adware, such as those given above. In such a case, what you call "unhelpful advice" becomes very helpful.