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How to check whether a particular url is safe or not ? (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 week ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[-] [email protected] 27 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

In general only click on a link if you trust the domain. A URL usually looks like this: https://first.second.third/... And only the second and the thrid word between dots are important.

For example: https://suspicious.google.com/ is in general fine, since the second and third word is google.com . However, https://lemmy.legit-lemmy.world/ is unsafe, because the second and thrid word are legit-lemmy.world, but not lemmy.world.

There are ways to smuggle unsafe asset under legit URL, usually by uploading them on google drive, github etc. The good rule of thumb is to never run anything on your computer unless you are absolutely sure it comes from trusted source, like from official website.

Official download webpage tends to have very descriptive and short URL, like

If you see long random strings on the download webpage then it is likely unsafe, for example:

[-] [email protected] 13 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Recently it has become a problem that optical twins of legit URLs exist, where some letters have been replaced by alike letters (homoglyphs) from different alphabets, see e.g. the list in this link.

Edit: Edge and Vivaldi seem to replace those letters by Punycode automalically, where in Firefox network.IDN_show_punycode needs to be enabled in the about:config.
bleepingcomputer.com

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

I’m pretty sure ff shows punycode automatically. I’ve never had to touch it at least and I get punycode.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago

Tbf, the article is from 2018. It possibly has changed in the meantime.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Dang. Is there an equivalent Firefox add-on that checks for this stuff?

No Homo Graphs was last updated in 2020.
URL unicode verifier was last updated in 2023 and only has 1 review.

It'd be nice to find something more recent.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 6 days ago

Ff shows punycode. The article is quite old.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 6 days ago

I don't even understand what it is, really; do you have an example of it in action?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago

🌽.ws

Should transform to https://xn--6h8h.ws/ when you click it. The xn— is the punycode prefix.

Here's how Punycode works:

Unicode characters are first converted into a series of code points, which are represented as a series of numbers. The code points are then converted into a series of ASCII characters, using a specific algorithm. The ASCII characters are then prepended with "xn--", which is a special prefix that indicates that the following characters are encoded in Punycode.

For example, the Unicode character 快 (which means fast in Chinese) is represented as the code point "U+5FEB". This code point is then converted into the ASCII characters "2s5v", which is prepended with the "xn--" prefix to give us "xn--2s5v". This can then be used as part of a domain name.

When the domain name is displayed to a user, the Punycode is converted back into Unicode characters, so that the user sees the original characters rather than the encoded version. This allows users to use and read domain names in their native scripts, even if their computer or device doesn't support those scripts.

https://www.link-assistant.com/seo-wiki/punycode/

[-] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Huh. Well, I was watching the URL bar the entire time and it only moved directly from the emoji to the X tweet; I never saw your decoded URL, unless it simply happens that fast, or I'm misunderstanding your last paragraph and that's what was supposed to happen.

Also, that's one heck of a short link, haha.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago

Might be because it’s a redirect… or maybe Firefox shows emojis directly but not other punycode?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

social

How can the configuration be done on the Android phone ?

[-] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago

Definitely don't click on links like this one: https://trustmethisisnotascam.com/

[-] [email protected] 13 points 1 week ago

Open it on your work computer like I do, to avoid problems with my personal device

[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 week ago

this one trick IT hates

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 week ago

virustotal.com can help at least somewhat.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

+ Norton Safe Web

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago

Someone else already mentioned it, but virustotal can check if the url is malicious. It’s not 100% of course but more often than not it will catch a malicious url. It’s a quick and easy way to check on-the-fly.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago

You can check URLs and files at virustotal.com for free.

If you have Windows 10/11 Pro and your computer supports virtualization, you can enable the Windows Sandbox in Windows Features too. This creates a temporary virtual machine with the bare essentials and no antivirus built in for testing stuff like this to see what the worst case scenario is if you visited/accessed.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

I work on my small Samsung Android phone. Is there any means of creating a sandbox here ?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

I’m not familiar on that platform, unfortunately, as I’m on iPhone.

But I think you should still be able to use virustotal’s website on mobile to check websites and also files.

There may be a sandbox app available for Android, but I’m not aware of any particular ones to recommend.

[-] [email protected] -1 points 1 week ago

Nice try. I'm not visiting virustotal.com.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

From gentlest to strongest intensity:

I use all 3. NoScript actually isn't needed for uBlock Origin and any forks of it like AdNauseam because they can also selectively disable/enable JavaScript, but I can't seem to find the section to do so in AdNauseam...

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

Use a friends computer

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

If it's a website use a website preview online service.

this post was submitted on 24 May 2025
36 points (97.4% liked)

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