Is Yahoo going to buy bit.ly?

According to inside sources, search giant Yahoo is considering purchasing the bit.ly. Although several other companies are also rumoured to be in talks with the URL shortener, Yahoo seems to be the most serious contender.

Purchasing bit.ly would help Yahoo better compete in the social media world. Some Internet marketing experts believe that the service isn’t valuable to Yahoo because it can shorten long URLs, but because of the large amount of data it could collect with it. Information such as which URLs are most popular and user behavior would help give Yahoo a competitive edge.

Source | Giga Om

Symantec : Shortened URLs pose security risk

Nearly all of us have used URL-shortening services such as bit.ly or TinyURL. They are a great convenience, but according to Symantec , pose a security threat.

The computer security firm says their malicious use is on the rise, and that they are especially dangerous because users do not always know where the links point.

The good thing about many modern URL-shorteners is they will generally display a gateway page before redirecting to the user to show what site the link points to. Not all services offer this feature or require it to be used, however. The next time you encounter a shortened link, think twice before clicking.

Source | Radio New Zealand