July 19, 2009

Shortened Links - Choose Carefully

Shortened links have now become a way of life!

It amazes me how quickly we adapt to change and innovation on the Web - I mean it wasn't that long ago that shortened links didn't even exist, and now we all have our favorites.

I found this really handy post on my trusted resource Daily Blog Tips that warned Careful with those Shortened Links. I warned to be careful of shortened links because one couldn't see where they were coming from and as with most things in life, those with sneaky minds has already found a way to exploit this.

"Shortened links also have a drawback, however, which is the fact that you can’t see where the link is pointing. Bring malicious users into the picture, and you can see the security risks."

And they warn that you should only click on shortened links if you know who they are coming from - which is sometimes very hard on Twitter, isn't it?

Unshortening Tool

But they do offer a great solution, and direct me to an unshortening tool, if I want to check out a link - Sucuri. It supports all the shortening tools.

Wide Range of Shortening Tools

So what do you use to shorten urls?

At the moment I'm using tinyurl but I use bit.ly on tweetdeck

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