bit.ly (http://bit.ly) is a website tool to shorten, share, and tracks your links. It makes links sharing easier because of long links became shorter and reduce mistyping. It also help the link sharer to tracks how many their link clicked, and even they will know where did the clicker located in the world.

I’ve seen bit.ly (http://bit.ly) links so many times when I’m browsing the web. come of them reffer to a good website and infos, but some links to a bad sites such as virus, advertising program, or even disturbing pict and scary sounds.

We can see the real bit.ly links by doing these 2 easy steps:

1. I’ll give you example with CNN’s twitter update links.

as we can see there is a bit.ly link, http://bit.ly/7DPgBT, from the latest CNN update.

2. do right click on the links and choose “copy link”, then paste it in a new tab of your browser, and add /info between bit.ly and the code after /, like the picture below.

and your browser will go into bit.ly page that shows the status about the link, and we can see that the link http://bit.ly/7DPgBT refers to http://edition.cnn.com/2009/BUSINESS/12/16/british.airways.finance.future/index.html, and we can choose to open or not to open it, based on the domain which is the real link located.

PS : you can do this when you receive bit.ly links from someone you dont really know or trusted. if you receive bit.ly links from a trusted sites like CNN twitter update, you dont need to do this.