No, you should not participate in 2017 Annual Visitor Survey, it’s a scam

Annual Visitor Survey is a fake pop-up that might appear during your browsing session. The fake survey is triggered by an adware program that may have sneaked to your PC without your knowledge. This PUP might also display other misleading ads, redirect to questionable websites and track information about you.
Similar scams show up every single year. However, their operation remains the same. 2017 Annual Visitor Survey informs that users were personally selected to participate in it. Different variants of the fake survey[1] promise to give various goodies in order to show gratitude for filling in the questionnaire:
- $100 Amazon gift card,
- iPad,
- iPhone,
- MacBook Pro,
- Samsung Galaxy.
We can assure that no one is going to give you discounts or latest gadgets for filling up few answers. The purpose of Annual Visitor Survey virus is to trick users that they can get free stuff. However, once you answer all the questions, you will be asked to enter some of your personal details, for instance, phone number or pay $5. Nevertheless, paying five dollars to get a twenty times bigger discount or the latest phone seems like a great deal; you won’t get anything.
The 2017 Annual Visitor Survey virus is based on social engineering. Crooks play with user’s hopes to won in the lottery. However, if you encounter this pop-up window, you should not get excited. Suggestion to complete it might be related to adware[2] attack.
This adware might affect the most popular web browsers, such as Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer. The name of the survey scam usually includes the name of your browser in order to look it more personalized. However, it’s just a trick.
The PUP that is responsible for delivering Annual Visitor Survey ads might also display other fake commercial offers, and redirect to potentially dangerous or misleading websites. All these activities might end up pretty bad. The adware might redirect to potentially hazardous or infected websites.
Unwanted activities on browser should motivate you to remove Annual Visitor Survey; however, there’s one more feature that we need to talk about. This ad-supported application is expected to track information about users, such as browsing history and technical information about the browser.
Most likely aggregated non-personally identifiable details and personal data collected from filled surveys is used for marketing purposes. Thus, it might be shared with affiliates and advertising networks that might want to sell their products or services to you.
You can stop these activities using security software, for instance, FortectIntego. Annual Visitor Survey removal should be smooth with another an up-to-date anti-malware tool as well. Besides, you can get rid of it manually. Instructions are presented below.

Devious infiltration method of ad-supported program
Users might be redirected to Annual Visitor Survey site when they are browsing through insecure websites, such as illegal movie streaming or adult-themed sites. However, in most cases, these pop-ups start bothering users after infiltration of adware.
This PUP travels and enters the system with the help of freeware or shareware. The virus has a chance to end up on the PC when a user installs a new program under “Quick” or “Recommended” settings. In order to avoid adware, browser hijackers, and other PUPs, you have to:
- download software from the reliable sources,
- use “Advanced” or “Custom” installation wizards,
- reject installation of additional programs by unmarking them.
According to our colleagues from Denmark,[3] attentive installation of programs is the best protection not only from PUPs, but malicious programs too.
Terminate Annual Visitor Survey virus from your browsers
In order to remove Annual Visitor Survey manually, you have to identify adware which is responsible for delivering these pop-ups or triggering redirects. This PUP might be located on the computer or each of the web browsers.
The step-by-step guide below will show you how to uninstall all potentially dangerous components from the system. However, you can speed up Annual Visitor Survey removal using anti-malware tool. Automatic elimination requires only scanning the system with security software.
Uninstall from Windows
Uninstall from Windows 10/8:
- Type Control Panel into the Windows search box and open the result.
- Under Programs, select Uninstall a program.

Uninstall from Windows 7/XP:
- Click on Windows Start > Control Panel (Windows XP users should click on Add/Remove Programs).
- In Control Panel, select Programs > Uninstall a program.

Remove the unwanted program:
- In the Programs and Features window, look for any recently installed suspicious entries, select them, and click Uninstall.
- If User Account Control appears, click Yes to confirm, then complete the removal.

Delete from macOS
Remove the unwanted application:
- From the menu bar, select Go > Applications.
- In the Applications folder, look for any suspicious entries, then drag them to Trash (or right-click and pick Move to Trash).

Delete leftover files and folders:
- Select Go > Go to Folder.
- Enter /Library/Application Support and remove any suspicious folders related to the unwanted program.
- Repeat the same check in the /Library/LaunchAgents and /Library/LaunchDaemons folders, deleting any suspicious entries.

- Finally, empty the Trash to permanently remove the leftovers.
Reset Internet Explorer
Remove dangerous add-ons:
- Open Internet Explorer, click on the Gear icon (IE menu) on the top-right corner of the browser
- Pick Manage Add-ons.
- You will see a Manage Add-ons window. Here, look for suspicious plugins. Click on these entries and select Disable.

Change your homepage if it was altered:
- Open IE and click on the Gear icon.
- Select Internet Options.
- In the General tab, delete the Home page address and replace it by your preferred one (for example, Google.com).
- Click Apply and then select OK.

Delete temporary files:
- Press on the Gear icon and select Internet Options.
- Under Browsing history, click Delete...
- Select relevant fields and press Delete.

Reset Internet Explorer:
- Click on Gear icon > Internet options and select Advanced tab.
- Select Reset.
- In the new window, check Delete personal settings and select Reset.

Remove from Microsoft Edge
Delete unwanted extensions from MS Edge:
- Select Menu (three horizontal dots at the top-right of the browser window) and pick Extensions.
- From the list, pick the extension and click on the Gear icon.
- Click Remove.

Clear cookies and other browser data:
- Click on the Menu (three horizontal dots at the top-right of the browser window) and select Settings > Privacy, search, and services..
- Under Clear browsing data, pick Choose what to clear.
- Select Cookies and other site data and Cached images and files. (apart from passwords, although you might want to include Media licenses as well, if applicable) and click on Clear.

Restore new tab and homepage settings:
- Click the menu icon and choose Settings.
- Then find On startup section.
- Click Remove next to any suspicious startup page.
Reset MS Edge if the above steps did not work:
- Press on Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open Task Manager.
- Click on More details arrow at the bottom of the window.
- Select Details tab.
- Now scroll down and locate every entry with Microsoft Edge name in it. Right-click on each of them and select End Task to stop MS Edge from running.

Instructions for Chromium-based Edge
Delete extensions from MS Edge (Chromium):
- Open Edge and click select Settings > Extensions.
- Delete unwanted extensions by clicking Remove.

Clear cache and site data:
- Click on Menu and go to Settings.
- Select Privacy, search and services.
- Under Clear browsing data, pick Choose what to clear.
- Under Time range, pick All time.
- Select Clear now.

Reset Chromium-based MS Edge:
- Click on Menu and select Settings.
- On the left side, pick Reset settings.
- Select Restore settings to their default values.
- Confirm with Reset.
- This will disable extensions and reset startup pages but will not delete bookmarks, saved passwords, or browsing history.

Remove from Mozilla Firefox (FF)
Remove dangerous extensions:
- Open Mozilla Firefox browser and click on the Menu (three horizontal lines at the top-right of the window).
- Select Add-ons.
- In here, select the unwanted extension and click Remove.

Reset the homepage:
- Click three horizontal lines at the top right corner to open the menu.
- Choose Settings.
- Under Home, set your preferred homepage and new tab settings.
Clear cookies and site data:
- Click Menu and pick Settings.
- Go to Privacy & Security section.
- Scroll down to locate Cookies and Site Data.
- Click on Clear Data...
- Select Cookies and Site Data and Temporary cached files and pages, then click Clear.

Reset Mozilla Firefox
If clearing the browser as explained above did not help, reset Mozilla Firefox:
- Open Mozilla Firefox browser and click the Menu.
- Go to Help and then choose Troubleshooting Information.

- Under Give Firefox a tune up section, click on Refresh Firefox...
- Once the pop-up shows up, confirm the action by pressing on Refresh Firefox.

Remove from Google Chrome
Delete malicious extensions from Google Chrome:
- Open Google Chrome, click on the Menu (three vertical dots at the top-right corner) and select More tools > Extensions.
- In the newly opened window, you will see all the installed extensions. Uninstall all suspicious extensions related to the unwanted program by clicking Remove.

Clear cache and web data from Chrome:
- Click on Menu and pick Settings.
- Under Privacy and security, select Clear browsing data.
- Select Browsing history, Cookies and other site data, as well as Cached images and files.
- Click Clear data.

Change your homepage:
- Click menu and choose Settings.
- Look for a suspicious site in the On startup section.
- Click on Open a specific or set of pages and click on three dots to find the Remove option.
Reset Google Chrome:
If the previous methods did not help you, reset Google Chrome to eliminate all the unwanted components:
- Click on Menu and select Settings.
- In the Settings, scroll down and click Advanced.
- Scroll down and locate Reset and clean up section.
- Now click Restore settings to their original defaults.
- Confirm with Reset settings.

Delete from Safari
Remove dangerous extensions:
- Open Safari, click Safari in the menu at the top-left of the screen, and select Preferences.
- Go to the Extensions tab, look for any suspicious entries, and click Uninstall to remove them.

Clear history and website data:
- Click Safari in the menu and pick Clear History.
- Set Clear to all history and confirm with Clear History.

Reset Safari:
- Click Safari in the menu and select Preferences > Advanced.
- Enable Show Develop menu in menu bar.
- From the menu bar, click Develop and select Empty Caches.

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