How in the Tech

Nuking the Search Helper extension from Firefox, Internet Explorer

By Adam Myers ⋅ July 12, 2010 ⋅ Tags: Firefox, Internet Explorer

While many Firefox users are rather reliant on their vast collection of installed extensions, few of them actively look at the list of installed add-ons through the browser interface. Users install the add-on they need to provide the functionality they desire; sometimes they get an update notification when a new version is available, but otherwise it’s a decent example of out of sight out of mind.

The mindset is perfectly acceptable until the situation Microsoft created in June’s monthly patch Tuesday. As part of their Windows updates released, one such patch included a Search Helper extension for your browser. Diligent users who skim over what each patch or update provides would still likely miss something like this – which calls into question why Microsoft would go this route as transparency is greatly craved by users. Chances are, this extension is registered within your Firefox browser and you didn’t even know it! What’s rather annoying is the add-on does absolutely nothing unless you have the Bing Toolbar installed. Worse, the extension cannot be uninstalled like the traditional Firefox add-on!

While this screen shot is from Firefox 4, Firefox 3 also has the Remove button .. removed. While it is possible to Disable the add-on, good security practice would not leave software installed that wasn’t needed. So what are your options?

Thankfully it’s actually pretty simple to remove the Search Helper Extension – it’s actually located on your file system under C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Search Enhancement Pack\Search Helper

Navigate to that folder location in Windows Explorer and delete the folder firefoxextension. Actually, while you are here you might as well delete it from Internet Explorer by removing the dll file SEPsearchhelperie.dll.