What is Shopswell?

Shopswell is an adware program that displays coupons, advertisements, and offers when browsing the web. Shopswell will install itself as a Chrome and Firefox extensions and a Browser Helper Object in Internet Explorer that injects ads into web sites that you are visiting.
These ads will be shown on sites regardless of whether or not they normally display ads. As some of the ads may overlay a web site’s content, the ads make it difficult to read the site you are visiting.
Ads by Shopswell

What is Shopswell?

Shopswell is advertised as a program that displays coupons for sites you are visiting and competitive prices when you are viewing product pages at sites like Amazon or eBay. Though this may sound like a useful service, the Shopswell program can be intrusive and will display ads whether you want them to or not.
When installed, the Shopswell browser extension will display advertising banners, pop-up advertisements and in-text ads, stating that they are brought to you by Shopswell. The Shopswell Ads will have different text under the pop-up: “Powered by Shopswell”, “Brought to you by Shopswell”, “You’ve received a premium offer from Shopswell” or “Ads by Shopswell”.
Ads By Shopswell pop-up virus
These ads are aimed to promote the installation of additional questionable content including web browser toolbars, optimization utilities and other products, all so the Shopswell publisher can generate pay-per-click revenue.
When infected with Shopswell the common symptoms include:

Advertising banners are injected with the web pages that you are visiting.
Random web page text is turned into hyperlinks.
Browser popups appear which recommend fake updates or other software.
Other unwanted adware programs might get installed without the user’s knowledge.
How did Shopswell got on my computer?

Shopswell is an adware program that is commonly bundled with other free programs that you download off of the Internet.
Unfortunately, some free downloads do not adequately disclose that other software will also be installed and you may find that you have installed Shopswell without your knowledge. Most commonly Shopswell is bundled within the installers from Cnet, Softonic or other similar custom third-party installers.

You should always pay attention when installing software because often, a software installer includes optional installs, such as this Shopswell adware. Be very careful what you agree to install.
Always opt for the custom installation and deselect anything that is not familiar, especially optional software that you never wanted to download and install in the first place.
It goes without saying that you should not install software that you don’t trust.