Twitter’s Link service automatically shortens links when you put them into Twitter, and even identifies
the untrustworthy ones for the recipients. An example of this comes courtesy of Harrell ‘Jersey Shore’ Kirstein, who sent me a direct message with a link that produced such an alert.
Twitter’s link service at http://t.co is used to better protect users from malicious sites that engage in spreading malware, phishing attacks, and other harmful activity.
A link converted by Twitter’s link service is checked against a list of potentially dangerous sites. When there’s a match, users can be warned before they continue:
Why would the spokes-model for the New Hampshire Democrat Party be sending me a Direct Message on Twitter, linked to a dangerous web site, at 2:45 AM on a Sunday morning?


