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Is Bit.ly a Security Risk for the White House?

Max Fisher 148 Views Jan 14, 2010
Are URL shorteners like bit.ly, which transform long web addresses into short links for social networking sites such as Twitter, a security risk? Anil Dash, a blogging expert working on government connectivity, thinks so, and urges the White House Twitter feed to avoid using the service. As he tells New York Times technology blogger Nick Bilton:
Bit.ly ends in .ly, which is actually a Libyan domain name. Probably not the best idea for the U.S. government to use. If the White House is sending me a Tweet, I need to know that it’s going to a trusted government resource.
Is Dash right to be concerned? Although its URL is associated with Libyran web addresses, bit.ly is an American company--it's not as if all its links are routed through Colonel Qaddafi's Blackberry. Nevertheless, Dash thinks the government would be wise to use go.usa.gov instead. He later quotes L.L. Cool J on an unrelated point.

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