Here are 2 methods on how to remove the MacDefender spyware from your Mac computer. They both involve you starting with killing the process before uninstalling the malware.

Visual Way

  1. Open Activity Monitor from the Utilities folder.
  2. Set the drop-down menu to all processes.
  3. Use the search field in Activity Monitor to search for MacDefender.
  4. Click on the MacDefender process.
  5. Click the Quit Process button.
  6. Click Force Quit.
  7. Drag the MacDefender program (installed in the Applications folder by default) to the Trash.
  8. Empty the Trash.
  9. If it exists, remove MacDefender from the Login Items for your Account in the OS X System Preferences.

Terminal Way

  1. Open Terminal application from the Utilities folder.
  2. Type this command in the terminal: ps -ax | grep -i MacDefender
  3. Take note of the process ID associated with the MacDefender program (the first digits in the result).
  4. Type this command in the terminal (use the process ID in place of XXXX): kill XXXX
  5. Drag the MacDefender program (installed in the Applications folder by default) to the Trash.
  6. Empty the Trash.
  7. If it exists, remove MacDefender from the Login Items for your Account in the OS X System Preferences.

Avoiding MacDefender in the Future

Apple has a good article on their support section called How to avoid or remove MacDefender malware in Mac OS X v10.6 or earlier. I’d recommend reading up on it for future reference.

That’s how to remove MacDefender Spyware. If you have your files backed up already, it may be a good idea to start anew. Check out the quick reformat guide for more information.

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