Someone can have a URL to a malicious site and use a URL shortener to disguise that fact in the hope that folks can be duped into using it.
If you use the shortener *yourself* to create a shortened link to a URL that you trust, the only problem is if 1. The URL is reassigned. This depends on how the shortener works and when their database will have to start purging used assignments. 2. The shortener system is hacked and the destination replaced. 3. The destination itself is hacked and the destination is infected with malicious content. This is the same risk whether or not a shortener is used. If the shortener service is abandoned or goes down, the shortened URL can become unusable. Likewise if the destination goes down, is abandoned, or it reorganizes its pages so that the particular URL now fails. The biggest limitation of a shortened URL is inability to know the true destination without accessing the shortener site somehow and inability to know the correct destination if the shortened URL is not working. My advice: Publish the full link that was known to work at the time of publication. A shortened URL could also be provided as a convenience for users entering URLs from printed copy, but the full one is the authentic, intended-to-be-persistent reference (along with other citation information so that someone could track down any new location, if necessary). - Dennis -----Original Message----- From: Ernie Kurtz [mailto:kurtz...@umich.edu] Sent: Sunday, February 24, 2013 11:31 To: users@openoffice.apache.org; jdeutsch.aspl...@gmail.com Subject: Re: using tinyurl or is.gd James and Jeffrey and Andrea, thank you! I do appreciate the warnings. Now a related question: is it possible to corrupt an already tied URL? I am working toward primarily print publication: if I put a tinyurl or is.gd link in print, for the reader to key in, can it somehow be corrupted? Even if there is an electronic version of what I write, can a link given in that format be corrupted? I have been under the impression that malware lurked in URLs posted online. Is that incorrect? ernie kurtz --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@openoffice.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@openoffice.apache.org --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@openoffice.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@openoffice.apache.org
