Do you want to be sure that you really are at the right web page? Is it a scam?

Use our Cloaked URL Checker to find out ...

As we've seen in our article on Identity Theft, a bug exists within Internet Explorer and Mozilla browsers which allows others to disguise the true destination of a link.

With this vulnerability (which also affects Internet Outlook, and Outlook Express), someone can provide a link which apears to be to a genuine web page or site (even when viewing the status bar text when hovering over the link. With Internet Explorer particularly, such a link can open a different web page to that shown in the address bar.

Given the high number of Internet Explorer users, this is a potentially very serious problem which leaves users open to Identity Theft scams (aka Phishing). Find out more and use our URL Bug Checker to see if your browser suffers this vulnerability now.

If your prgrams do suffer this bug, you can use the following script to check each URL or web address as shown in your browser's address bar, to see the true location of the page that you are viewing.

Follow these instructions to use this utility ...

Once you are at a web page that you wish to check, leave that page open and do the following to see the true location of that page.

1. Highlight, or select, all of this code, then copy it (right click and select copy) ...

javascript:alert("The true URL is:\t\t" + location.protocol + "//" + location.hostname + "/" + "\nIf this does not match the URL shown in your browser address bar, you are likely to be seeing a web page from a different web site! We recommend that you close you browser and empty your browser cache now.");

2. Now go to the browser that has the page that you wish to check, and replace the whole URL in the address bar with the copied code,

3. Press enter, and a pop up message box will advise you of the true URL If there is a difference between the two, you are most likely at a spoofed web address with a forged web page. Close that web browser and empty your browser cache.

This method of spoofing is a growing problem and in the absence of a complete fix from Microsoft, millions of internet users are open to Phishing Scams - a form of Identity Theft which involves forged email and or web page(s) which aim to steal your financial and/or personal data to commit fraud.