Twitter Scrutinize Links to Prevent Malware

Since few months Twitter users are facing problem of spamming through direct messages on their Twitter accounts. The direct messages contain links to unwanted websites and spreading malware and phishing. The main reason for quick spread is because the link is shortened and as soon as user clicks on the link, it directs them to unwanted websites.

Twitter took an action against it and removed all such detected malware links. Twitter is also trying to expand the link service which is right now in testing mode on few twitter employees. According to this new policy, the links shared will be shortened with a t.co URL for display on SMS and for web user it will be either whole URL / page title or half URL such as for a link https://devilsworkshop.org/share-large-files-for-free-online-with-wetransfer/ , web users may see the links as devilsworkshop.org/share-large.

The twitter developers are trying to select the shortened link which is informative and appropriate for application. Right now Twitter is rolling out this services on few accounts like @TwitterAPI, @raffi etc. Soon it will be rolled out for all the links and accounts.

According to me, Twitter took a nice step against malware links. At least we don’t have to be  conscious while clicking on shortened link and keep guessing on which page we are going to land. Hope Twitter takes this step soon for all the accounts. Mean time, if you want to secure yourself with spam shortened links then you can try out Unhid to expand the links and check where shortened URLs redirect you.

Via: Twitter Blog